Climate Solutions Road Tour

Our epic five week electric car journey across India, aimed at launching a movement for climate action across India, reached its final destination, New Delhi, on February 4, though the work is continuing to document and spread solutions and a message of hope and change. The Indian Youth Climate Network team reached Delhi having covered 3500 ’low-carbon’ kilometers in three solar-powered Revas and a fleet of alternative vehicles. 

 

 

The trip, which has passed through 15 major Indian cities including Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune, Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Udaipur, Jaipur and Delhi, was undertaken in a caravan of alternatively fuelled vehicles including three market ready solar-integrated Reva electric cars, a plant oil powered truck, a van running on spent vegetable oil, and a car with solar panels on the roof to power the team’s equipment.

Accompanied by the world’s first completely solar-powered band from the US, the entire team has been seeking to create, communicate and celebrate solutions to climate change. They create solutions by inspiring individuals and empowering them through leadership trainings; communicate solutions by spreading the message of the urgency of climate change and the availability of political, technological and personal solutions through music, art, dance, and interactive discussions; and celebrate solutions through their positive and optimistic approach to the issue of climate change and eco-festivals honoring local organizations.

The team has documented ground breaking climate solutions, across every sector and many states, which they plan to share and scale up to be the start of a solutions-oriented movement for transformative change. The team has charged at petrol pumps during diesel strikes, visited tribal girls' hostels where the kitchen runs on solar energy, worked with villagers making compost and biogas, found effective waste management strategies in Mumbai, and made dozens of short films about these solutions along the way.

From 90 year old women who have never left their village to international school children in Mumbai and Hyderabad and from respected NGOs to CEOs spreading their Indian innovations all over the world, the team has met with dozens of climate leaders who have shared their climate solutions!

One of the key opportunities this journey has highlighted is the potential for a clean transport system in India and internationally, where petrol pumps can become decentralized suppliers of clean energy for non-polluting electric vehicles, as well as the technological, political and infrastructural gaps that must and can be bridged to achieve such a goal. With their epic journey, the team is calling on global decision makers and consumers to seize this opportunity to reinvent the auto industry.

The journey ended in India's capital, New Delhi on February 4th, where they had the chance to meet Thomas Friedman (NY Times), Abhinav Bhindra (India's gold medal Olympian), Kapil Sibal (Minister of Science and Technology), RK Pachauri (Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), Larry Brilliant (CEO of google.org), and the President of India-Pratibha Patil!

With the end of this journey, the Indian Youth Climate Network and its partners, including Moser Baer, Infosys, Reva, Freeplay Technologies, Kun Group, Valence Energy, Yale, CleanStar and the American Center have created a mass of people, young and old, across India, passionate about climate change and ready for urgent action to improve local and global environment. This journey is just the beginning, as the Indian Youth Climate Network (IYCN) continues its work to generate awareness and to empower a generation of climate leaders to take effective action against climate change, at a local, state, national and international level.

En route, we found dozens of exciting and inspiring climate solutions, all of which can be found in brief in a list of all of our Road Tour Solutions. Each sun on the map is another climate solution, as marked below!

See all the solutions from the Road Tour and our videos.

 

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