Srinagar, May 3 -- In a sleepy hamlet of Gurez, where apple trees bloom against receding snowlines, Abdul Rehman tends to his orchard with quiet worry.

"Snow used to fall in November," he says, pulling his shawl tighter. "Now it waits till January, and the flowers bloom too early." The shift has disrupted pollination, lowered yields, and deepened uncertainty.

Rehman is no climate policy expert. Yet, his life, like millions across the Global South, is shaped by a crisis born far from his orchard and intensified by solutions that increasingly exclude him.

As the world accelerates toward "green" innovation, the reality beneath the slogans is more complicated. Behind every electric car and solar panel lie hidden environmental costs, extrac...