NEW DELHI: India is the world’s largest country in terms of population, comprising about 17 percent of the global total. It is also the fifth-largest economy in the world and on its way to becoming the third-largest by 2030.
Yet its contribution to cumulative carbon dioxide emissions since the industrial revolution is a mere 3.4 percent of the global total. And at 2 tonnes, its per-capita emissions are less than half the global average of 4.7 tonnes.
India’s per-capita carbon footprint is also the lowest among G20 countries, and the International Finance Corporation has acknowledged that the nation is the only G20 member that is in line with the international target of limiting warming to less than 2 degrees Celsius compared with preindustrial levels.
Additionally, the IFC has highlighted the fact that India’s gross domestic product grew by a compound annual growth rate of about 7 percent between 2005 and 2019, while emissions increased at a CAGR of about 4 percent. This would appear to underscore India’s relative success in decoupling economic growth from greenhouse gas emissions, thereby reducing the “emission intensity” of its GDP and becoming a possible model for the world in general and the Global South in particular.
Leading India’s determination to be part of the global solution to climate change, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced in November 2021, during the UN Climate Change Conference, COP26, in Glasgow, Scotland, a five-point climate-action plan for India, called Panchamrit. It included the key commitment of achieving net-zero emissions by 2070, and four goals to help achieve this, which were later incorporated into India’s nationally determined contributions to the international efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
These goals are: 500 gigawatts of non-fossil fuel power generation by 2030; 50 percent of India’s power requirements met by renewable energy by 2030; reduction of total projected carbon emissions by 1 billion tonnes by 2030; and a reduction of the economy’s carbon intensity by 45 percent by 2030 compared with 2005.
Many of these goals upped the already significant targets India had set for itself following COP21 in Paris in 2015. This increased ambition was possible because India had achieved its nationally determined contributions well ahead of time.
In fact, with regard to the use of non-fossil fuel resources for energy, India achieved its goal of 40 percent of cumulative electrical power installation capacity provided by non-fossil-fuel-based energy sources in 2021, nine years ahead of the target of 2030. Furthermore, between 2017 and 2023, India added about 100 gigawatts of installed electrical capacity, of which about 80 percent was attributed to non-fossil-fuel-based resources. Now, the share of non-fossil-fuel-based resources in installed electricity capacity has reached 45.4 percent.
India also met its key initial target of a 33 percent reduction in the emissions intensity of GDP by 2030, compared with the 2005 level, in 2019, 11 years early.
Aside from the four goals of its Panchamrit pathway, India has also undertaken to create a carbon sink that can handle an additional 2.5-3 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, through the provision of additional forest and tree cover by 2030. So far, the country has created carbon sinks with a capacity of about 1.97 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, putting it on track to achieve this nationally determined contribution.
Through its ambitious policies, successful renewable-energy growth trajectory and achievement of international commitments, India has strongly demonstrated climate leadership at a global level.
With climate change seen by many as the defining challenge of our time, India has assumed a pivotal role in the efforts to tackle the issue, both in terms of its actions and as the leading voice of the Global South on sustainability.
• Manjeev S. Puri is the former ambassador of India to the EU and lead negotiator at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
