Reducing petroleum consumption has the dual effect of strengthening economy at short term, and of pushing the D-day a little in the long run. .
One must be a vandal to criticize progress for its own sake. But there is also no sense in not seeing where one is going, and rushing head first against a brick wall. We must progress with one eye on the future. We must progress without severely damaging our ability to progress in the future. We must leave the world more or less as we found it. We owe it to our future generations. But the large scale use of hydrocarbons, especially combustion of petroleum in cars, release green house gases like ca rbon dioxide and carbon monoxide and also unburned hydrocarbons. Today every school kid is aware of the impending apocalypse.
The major challenge that is faced today is economic. In real terms the fossil fuels are extremely costly. But due to large subsidies, petroleum derivatives are cheaper than the other possible options. The market economy could never fully influence the price of petroleum in India due to government intervention. One option may be to issue petroleum cards for every family which they can exchange subsidized fuel. After the cards finish the consumer is to get unsubsidized petroleum. .
History has taught us that nothing can be swept away at one go. Such endeavour always result in a failure. Let us remember the plant from which our country got her name. Indigo plantations. There were hundreds of protests and strikes against there planters. That did not result in much. One small discovery, by the Germans, put an end to indigo plantation and all the associated evils. The well recognized adverse environmental effects of large scale petroleum usage were brought into sharp focus recently by the proposed oil exploration in the arctic region in America, destroying the flora and fauna of the region. There are many environmental groups which oppose the exploitation on the ground that it will destroy the ecology of the region.
