Climate resilient infrastructure and zero carbon housing are the way out to combat climate change

Anwar Zeb

A meeting took place in Islamabad earlier in December last year to discuss the climate change. Federal Minister for Climate Change Sherry Rehman and other speakers addressed the meeting.

The meeting stressed planning regarding climate resilience and zero carbon housing.

Deputy Director Climate Change and Environmental Protection Afsar Khan told TNN that the climate change was a reality which required preparedness whether it was in the form of climate resilient infrastructure or zero carbon housing.

He said that greenhouse gases were not only produced by Pakistan, rather, all the countries were contributing their share of them. However, he said that only proper planning could save Pakistan from ill-effects of the greenhouse gases.

He said that Pakistan’s pre-planning was in the form of nationally determined contributions or NDCs, which has been determined by the Pakistani authorities to reduce its emissions to 50 percent by 2030.

Afsar said that 15 percent of gases will be reduced voluntarily while 36 others will be reduced in case of developing countries extending technology transfers, financial assistance and capacity building.

However, he said that Pakistanis need to built house whose energy requirements could be met from solar or wind energy. “We need to work to reduce the emission of green house gases,” he said.

Besides, he said that zero carbon emission strategy entailed solarization of buildings or plantations around them.

He said that when plants absorbed sun light and will not allow it to shine or enter the house, thus will it cool.

It is worth mentioning here said that Pakistan suffers losses worth billions of rupees every year in natural disasters resulting from climate change. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has witnessed 197 deaths and scores others injured due to natural disasters over last two years. Similarly, large number of buildings was also destroyed.

Similarly, August last year floods killed 358 people in the province while 2022 others were injured. The floods also destroyed 37,000 houses while 100,000 others were partially damaged.