I stumbled upon the name Prachi Shevgaonkar purely by chance. But I’m glad I did. If ever there were an inspirational young person, actively doing her bit towards climate change awareness – and action – at an individual level, it is Prachi.
She describes herself on her LinkedIn profile, as – ‘Founder & CEO, Cool The Globe – A Citizen Led Platform for Climate Action | Media Professional with a vision to make a difference | TEDx Speaker | Climate Entrepreneur | 4M on Quora.’ I was sceptical. I mean we all know about the false hats we wear on social media. But hers is scarily true.
I’ve interviewed her here, in particular about her role as Founder & CEO of her app Cool The Globe, and her role as a Climate Entrepreneur. Here’s what she had to say…
NS: Tell me something about your childhood that would help tie in to the passionate young lady I see today.
PS: When I was in the fourth standard, my schoolteacher did an interesting experiment. She asked us to write a letter to our future selves, ten years hence.
She asked us to address questions like – Where would I like to be? Who would I want to be?
I wrote that letter, and I completely forgot about it. Ten years later, I happened to find it. In that letter, a young me had spoken about making an impact. Changing the world.
Reading it was a wake-up call. I was at a very decisive point in my life. I was about to opt for becoming an engineer, like the rest of my family. Instead, I enrolled into a media school which felt more like my calling. And I started looking for ways in which I could make a meaningful impact. In a way, the vision of my younger self set me on the path that I am today.
NS: What exactly does your app Cool The Globe do? Can you please explain to our readers?
PS: Cool The Globe is a free, citizen led app for climate action. It helps individuals reduce their Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions to a target.
When we set out to build this app, we started thinking, to achieve anything at all, what do we need? I realized that first, I needed a clear goal in front of me, and then, it helped me achieve things if I was able to measure my progress against that goal. So, that is exactly how Cool The Globe works.
In the app, each user is given a monthly and an annual target to reduce their GHG emissions, and progress is tracked. Then, users can make savings across 100+ customisable climate actions, embedded into their day-to-day life. Most importantly, they can see the GHG emissions they avoided with each corresponding action.
Many people question the difference that one individual can make. We believe that when many people come together, our collective impact can be extraordinary. To embody that, we have a global meter on the home page of the app, which shows in real time, the collective emissions avoided.
So far, our global meter has recorded 1000+ tonnes of avoided GHG emissions.
NS: I’ve heard of counting steps, and sadly, I’ve heard of counting calories. But I haven’t heard of counting my own GHG emissions. How did you hit upon this idea? And why is it important to keep track of the numbers?
PS: Cool The Globe started as a personal quest, from a very simple question: What can I do about climate change? In the journey to answer this question, my family and I took up a simple pledge. We decided to reduce our own GHG emissions by 10% every year. So, we started researching which of our activities were leading to the most GHG emissions. Basically, we chased two questions – How can I reduce them? How can I measure them?
As you rightly said, many people these days count the calories in their food. The thinking was similar – Can we also track the emissions behind our actions? That’s what we began to do. Numbers are important, because in order to change anything, we need to measure it first.
When I started measuring the impact of my actions, something interesting happened. It made me happy. It felt good to know, that at least at my own level, I was doing something.
The second interesting thing was, that many of my friends and relatives took notice. People would see me take small initiatives at home and would ask if they could join too.
That’s when I started thinking broader – about how I could involve global citizens, on this individual quest that I had undertaken. And from this, the idea for Cool The Globe was born.
NS: So, for someone who is severely tech challenged, can you explain in simple terms what were the main steps involved in the development of your app?
PS: The first step was to conceptualize my vague idea into a concrete platform. Designing, storyboarding, mapping out the journey a user will have, drawing and ideating each screen, and brainstorming on every detail for hours on end.
The key challenge was deciding how to quantify individual actions. We considered many options, and finally zeroed on CO2eq avoided GHG emissions, as a uniform metric of measuring impact.
Then it came to categorising various forms of climate actions, researching emissions factors, per capita emissions for countries, working on integrating a variety of climate actions under one platform, and simplifying them as much as possible.
Quite a lot of time was spent on the Global Meter, as we had to maintain an external database which could update on the app in near real time.
Finally, it came the actual coding, front end UI/X designing, and testing the app. 200+ students were kind enough to lend a hand in beta testing to make the platform fool proof.
NS: What are the top two biggest hurdles you face currently with your app?
PS: It was an extremely fulfilling experience to receive an overwhelming response to Cool The Globe upon the launch of our campaigns for climate action. Thousands of citizens, organisations, and leaders got in touch wanting to get involved. As a result of this grassroot, word of mouth spread, Cool The Globe turned into a citizen-led movement for climate action.
So, to do justice to the well-wishers and citizen advocates who have rallied with us, our challenge is to scale up, and scale up fast. In response to support from citizens and users, there are many enhancements, exciting features, and on ground initiatives that we plan to bring to the forefront over the next year. Rallying up the resources and the infrastructure for this, is a key challenge currently.
But, I would say this is a good challenge to have.
NS: What is the most bizarre reason you’ve received for rejection of your app?
PS: There was a gentleman who kept calling me, trying to convince me that climate change was not real, and that I was wasting my time and my youth working on it.
Admittedly, that was quite bizarre.
NS: Haha I saw that eye roll. That brings me to, how can we bring about a core shift in mindset about climate change? Which age group is the trickiest to convince?
PS: For the longest time, climate change seemed like this larger than life problem, beyond my control. I was hearing big words, but I couldn't see how climate change was really affecting me, or anybody around me. It was only when I met some real voices behind the catastrophic impacts of climate change, that I wanted to do something about it.
As ordinary people, we care about very simple things. We care about our food. Our homes. Our health. Our families, and the people around us. When we start talking about the big problems in the world today – problems like climate change, in the language of people, in the context of the things they care about, things they consider worth fighting for – that’s when citizens can be inspired to drive change.
So the idea is to humanize climate change. To make it relatable to the common man. I feel like that’s when more and more people would rise up to take action on it.
NS: How can we influence our youth about the importance of climate change and the role we all play in this? It tends to get shelved as something politicians need to put in place, not each of us individually.
PS: During this lockdown, I have been able to talk to inspiring young people from different corners of the world. One day, a nine-year-old girl emailed me. She said that she didn't have a phone yet to use the app but she still wanted to do something. She asked me what changes she could make in her life to fight climate change.
She taught me an important lesson – Our actions matter a lot more than our words.
Whenever I interact with children in schools, I get asked the toughest questions on climate change. I am very happy to say this – I think more and more young people are already aware, knowledgeable and proactive on climate change. All we need to do is empower them, give them a platform and a voice to bring forward their thoughts and innovations.
NS: Bragging time! Have you won any awards? Has Cool The Globe received any accolades that you are particularly proud of? Tell us!
PS: Haha yes! We have received a good amount of support along the way. We received the Olive Crown Award, from the International Advertising Association, and they were kind enough to name me as the Young Green Crusader of the Year.
I had the honour of becoming the first Indian to be appointed on the advisory board of the climate leadership coalition, along with global leaders, like the former Prime Minister of Finland! And the Rotary Club conferred us with the Taru Lalvani Award for Environment Protection.
But the biggest accolade for me is the ordinary citizens who joined our mission. Through our campaigns, we were able to reach over 2 million citizens from around the world. Today, we have users from over 100 countries coming together to take action.
These awards belong to all these citizens, who have showed courage to make a difference in their day-to-day lives. They have taught me that when we come together to bring change, miracles can happen.
NS: What is the one thing you need the most to make Cool The Globe reachable to more people?
PS: The one thing that we need the most today is support from you, the reader. I have experienced first-hand the power that we hold when we take action. So hit us with your suggestions, feedback and any other way in which you could contribute to the cause. With your backing, we can realise our dream of integrating climate action in the lives of global citizens.
NS: What would be the top three easiest things for each of us to put in place, in our everyday lives, that could help us reduce our own emissions?
PS: That’s a great question! The three top categories we have in the app are:
- Switching to low emission transport.
- Altering our usage of appliances.
- Reducing our usage of materials.
‘Easy’ would vary from person to person, but it is always great to start with what’s easiest for you!
Climate action is meaningful when it aligns with other goals in our lives as well, and climate action can be consistent, when we have fun doing it. So for example, if your resolution is to become healthier, you can start cycling more instead of taking a car. If you want to save money, you can shop less and save on materials.
The most important part is to start with an action, today. And then find out the emissions you are saving by taking that action.
Then, inspire your friends to follow suit. One action has the power to influence ten other people and create a wildfire of transformation.
NS: Do you have any parting words that you want us to reflect on?
PS: The biggest lesson that I learnt through this journey is that you don’t have to do anything alone. There are people who will support you, uplift you and grow with you. Cool The Globe is only the result of thousands of citizens who made it their own.
If a project I started from my dorm room can turn into a global enterprise and a movement then anything can happen.
So to other young people I want to say:
Hold on to your big dreams and the fire inside you.
And together, we will make it happen.
Cool The Globe app is available on the Android platform. The iOS version is currently under review and will launch shortly. Prachi can be contacted at prachi@cooltheglobe.org
Nalini Sorensen is an award-winning children’s author, who loves spending time with children and looking at the world through the wonder of their eyes. She believes that life is too short to not laugh and seems to always attract highly humorous situations in her real life. She lives in Mumbai with her husband, two sons and dog.
Nalini has written numerous books, across various age groups, for children, and has been published by several publishers in India. She has contributed to anthologies, to children’s magazines, and has written readers for schools in India. She is a TEDx speaker, and has attended and presented at numerous literary events across India.
She’s on Instagram (@nalinisorensen) and on Facebook (@NaliniSorensenAuthor).