Arvind's Newsletter

1.Adani Green becomes first Indian firm to cross 15 GW renewable capacity: Business Standard

Adani Group's renewable arm, Adani Green Energy (AGEL), has become the first Indian company in its field to surpass 15,000 megawatts (MW) or 15 gigawatts (GW) of installed operational capacity. In an exchange filing on Monday, the company announced that its total capacity stood at 15,539.9 MW as of June 2025, making it the country’s largest renewable energy player and placing it among the top 10 independent power producers globally.

The company’s current capacity can power about 7.9 million households and offset an estimated 28.6 million tonnes of carbon emissions each year. That is equivalent to taking 6.3 million cars off the road or the carbon absorption of 1.36 billion trees, AGEL said.

2.Monsoon covers entire India ahead of expected date: Economic Times

India’s monsoon rains have covered the entire country by June 29, over a week ahead of schedule, giving a big boost to summer crop planting.

The early and stronger-than-expected southwest monsoon is crucial for half of India’s farmland and is forecast to be above normal this year. This is expected to push up production of rice, soybeans, and other key crops.

The Reserve Bank of India expects the robust rains, high reservoir levels, and softening global commodity prices to ease food inflation and improve agricultural output in 2025–26 — though climate risks persist.

3.Luxury EVs surge 66% in India in 2025 as wealthy shift from ICE cars: Business Standard

That’s the total number of luxury electric vehicles (EVs) sold in India from January to May 2025, up 65% from 1,223 units during the same period last year, according to Business Standard citing VAHAN data.

According to data available with VAHAN, the share of EVs in the luxury segment rose from 7 per cent in January–May 2024 to 11 per cent during the same period in 2025, marking a 65 per cent growth in the electric luxury segment.

This trend is reflected in the pre-owned car market too. About 19 per cent of luxury vehicles sold so far in calendar year 2025 are EVs, up sharply from less than 5 per cent during the same period last year, according to Luxury Cart, a leading player in the pre-owned luxury car space. A major reason for the rising interest among premium customers is a series of new EV launches by majors like Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Audi.

4.Passport Seva 2.0: What is an E-passport, how to apply, benefits and full guide: Mint

India has launched e-passports as part of the Passport Seva Programme 2.0, aiming to modernize passport issuance and enhance security. The e-passports feature an RFID chip for contactless verification, ensuring compliance with international standards and streamlining immigration processes.

An e-passport is a next-generation travel document with a secure RFID chip embedded inside the cover. The chip stores key information, including the passport holder’s biometric data, photo, name, and other personal details.

The new e-passports are distinguishable by a gold-coloured symbol printed at the bottom of the cover — a global standard for electronic travel documents.

The chip allows contactless verification and faster immigration clearance at global airports. It complies with ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organisation) standards, ensuring international interoperability and enhanced fraud protection.

5 Worries about rising US Debt: Financial Times and others

A mammoth spending program being debated by the US Senate this week will swell the country’s debt and threaten its financial standing, analysts warned. Some 20 cents of every dollar taken in tax revenue is now allocated to debt servicing, and the One Big Beautiful Bill Act is forecast to grow the deficit by a further $3.3 trillion over a decade. More than 90% of economists in a Financial Times survey said they were concerned about the haven status of dollar-denominated assets, in part because of the planned fiscal expansion. Republicans are wavering on the issue, while former presidential adviser Elon Musk was more pointed, calling the plan “utterly insane.”

6.A dangerous heat wave gripping Europe led to record temperatures and weather warnings across the continent: New York Times

France, Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain are experiencing the most extreme conditions, caused by a high-pressure “heat dome” over Western Europe, with southwest Spain suffering a record 114.8°F (46°C).

Europe is the world’s fastest-warming continent, partly due to its proximity to the Arctic — the polar region is seeing temperatures rise four times faster than global averages — and, paradoxically, to its success in reducing pollution: particulates in the atmosphere masked some of the warming effect of carbon emissions, and as the air has become cleaner, that masking has been reduced.

7. The head of the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog said Iran could produce enriched uranium within “months,” contradicting US President Donald Trump’s assertion that Tehran’s nuclear program was “obliterated.” : New York Times and others

Rafael Grossi’s remarks echoed an earlier US assessment and European intelligence suggesting Iran’s nuclear ambitions were set back by just months — senior Iranian officials also reportedly said the US strikes weren’t as destructive as they’d expected as reported in Washington Post.

While the American attack may have stalled Iran’s near-term ability to make a bomb, some of the targeted facilities might not have existed if Trump hadn’t abandoned an earlier nuclear deal in his first term, experts told The New York Times. Trump said he would consider bombing Iran again if Tehran enriched uranium to worrisome levels.

8.Your next home could be made from superwood : The Wall Street Journal

The engineered material is stronger than steel—and bulletproof.

“A strange new substance will begin rolling off the assembly line: soft wood transformed at the molecular level into something stronger than steel yet one-sixth the weight.

Its name is, maybe, a bit on the nose: Superwood.

Its maker, startup InventWood, says it could someday replace steel I-beams in the skeleton of a building, while being impact-resistant enough for bulletproof doors. It’s also fire resistant—the outside carbonises in a way that protects the inside, and it won’t sag in a fire like steel. It would be a coup if the company can replace a good chunk of construction-grade steel and concrete with scrap wood that is otherwise unusable waste.

Superwood is also, I can attest, beautiful. The densification process deepens its color and brings out its natural grain. Alex Lau, InventWood’s chief executive, handed me several of the oddly lustrous, improbably stiff boards as we toured the company’s test lab and under-construction factory in central Maryland.

In my hands, Superwood feels like an otherworldly object—amazingly strong and light. I could easily snap an eighth-of-an-inch-thick pine board in half (not to brag), but a sheet of Superwood with the same dimensions merely flexes slightly, no matter my effort. A foot-long stick, just a half-inch thick, was so rigid I couldn’t bend it at all.” Read on

9.The most peaceful country in the world in Iceland: Newsweek

The new Global Peace Index (GPI) report ranked countries based on their "level of peacefulness," placing Russia as the least-peaceful country and Iceland as the "most peaceful country" in the world.

The 19th edition of the report from the Australia-based Institute of Economics & Peace (IEP) looked at 163 independent states and territories using 23 indicators to measure the level of societal safety and security, the extent of ongoing domestic and international conflicts, and the degree of militarization.

Published earlier this month, the GPI had a relatively unchanged top 10, which Iceland topped, followed by Ireland, New Zealand, Austria, Switzerland, Singapore, Portugal, Denmark, Slovenia, and Finland.

10.The Mozart of the attention economy’: why MrBeast is the world’s biggest YouTube star: The Guardian (Long Read)

Jimmy Donaldson, the 27-year-old online content creator and entrepreneur known as MrBeast, is by any reasonable metric one of the most popular entertainers on the planet. His YouTube channel, to which he posts his increasingly elaborate and expensively produced videos, has 400 million subscribers – more than the population of the United States of America and equivalent to the total number of native English speakers currently alive. It’s close to twice as many subscribers as Elon Musk has X followers, and over 100 million more than Taylor Swift has Instagram followers. And that number, 400 million, does not account for the people who watch MrBeast’s videos in passing, or who are aware of his cultural presence because of their children, or who just sort of know who he is but don’t have any intricate awareness as to why he is famous.

That number is the number of people who have made the volitional move of clicking that subscribe button, to ensure that they will a) not miss his latest videos and b) can be literally counted by potential advertisers as a more-or-less guaranteed audience. One last fact, before we move away from numbers and into more nebulous modes of consideration: his 2024 Amazon Prime reality competition show, Beast Games, in which 1,000 contestants competed for $5m (£3.7m), the largest cash prize in television history, reportedly cost $100m to produce, making it the most expensive unscripted show in history. Jimmy Donaldson, at the risk of belabouring the obvious, is an incredibly big deal. Read on.