India is not expected to announce any plans at the U.N. climate talks to begin limiting its emissions
LIMA (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – India is not expected to announce any plans at the U.N. climate talks to begin limiting its emissions but the country will talk up plans for a five-fold increase in the use of solar power by 2030, Indian negotiators said.
“Peaking of emissions (by a fixed date) is not in the near-term agenda of India,” said one negotiator at the Lima talks.
But while seeking to position itself as a champion of renewable energy, India is also exploring a revision of its environmental laws to give special fast-track approval to power and mining projects, and allow industries to self-certify their environmental compliance, diluting the powers of the National Green Tribunal.
The country is also lining up a coal supply for the future, with Indian conglomerate Adani Enterprises Ltd. setting up a $7.2 billion Australian dollar coal mine project in Carmichael in the north of the Galilee Basin in Australia’s Central Queensland. The project plans to produce 60 million tonnes of coal each year.
After the United States and China recently declared emissions reductions targets, India - whose climate-changing emissions are expected to grow strongly in coming years – has come under pressure to come up with similar plans.
India’s government, however, has made it clear that the onus of reducing carbon emissions rests with richer industrialised countries, and it will oppose any move to shift the burden to developing nations.
It has been calling for preservation of the 1992 basis for classifying countries as industrialised or developing, under which all countries have “common but differentiated responsibilities” to curb emissions.
At Lima, “we are confident that all developed and developing countries will accommodate (those) principles,” said India’s Union Minister for Environment, Forests and Climate Change, Prakash Javadekar, in New Delhi last week.
He arrived in Lima over the weekend for the final week of negotiations, which are set to end Friday.
THE MODI FACTOR
These are the first international climate negotiations since Narendra Modi became India’s prime minister earlier this year, and speculation has been rife about how the business-minded leader might change India’s positions on climate change.
But the country’s negotiators have said there will be no major change in position, with issues of equity and common but differentiated responsibility at the forefront for India.
India is working on its plan for what it intends to contribute to international efforts to curb climate change and adapt to its impacts. Such voluntary contributions from around the world are due to be announced next March and will add up to a new agreement to fight climate change expected to be signed in Paris in 2015.
According to a report by The Economic Times, while work on India’s plan is likely to be completed over the next few months, a formal declaration will not happen until at least March. But India’s contributions also could come as late as June, officials in Lima suggested.
The government is currently evaluating the country’s progress in meeting an existing 2010 pledge to reduce its emissions intensity – or how much carbon it emits per unit of production – by 20 to 25 percent from 2005 levels by 2020. Results of the evaluation are due this month or next, according to an Indian negotiator at Lima.
India’s environmental minister also is expected to push at the negotiations for a “collaborative approach” to help India adopt clean energy technology and resolve current deadlocks over intellectual property issues.
SOLAR SURGE
India’s new and renewable energy ministry is working on ramping up the share of India’s energy produced by solar power from six percent to15 percent by 2030. The government is also looking at reworking the National Action Plan on Climate Change, announced in 2008, to ensure that it is more focussed on addressing impacts of climate change.
India is also pushing for more attention to adaptation to climate impacts in any new climate agreement.
“We would also like a long-term global goal for adaptation to be clearly articulated in qualitative and quantitative terms,” said Susheel Kumar, one of the negotiators for India.
Ravi Prasad, the lead negotiator for India, said at a press conference in Lima that working out the transfer of clean technology to India and sorting out intellectual property issues around it are a clear priority for the country.
“Until we have some kind of assurance and support (on those issues), it will be difficult for the developing countries to elucidate their (national contributions),” he said.
(Reporting by Avik Roy; editing by Laurie Goering)
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