Setting the COP agenda (GS Paper 3, Environment)
Context:
- India’s announcements at the 26th and 27th Conference of Parties (COP) are now the pillars of its climate leadership.
India’s Long-Term Strategy (LTS):
- If COP26 was a watershed moment because of the India’s announcement of the country’s plan to go net-zero by 2070, in 2022, COP27 in Egypt will be remembered for the India’s path-breaking announcement of a long-term strategy (LTS) for low carbon development.
- With this, India joins the coveted list of 56 countries that have submitted their LTS documents to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
- The 121-page LTS is consistent with India’s net-zero targets and gives key industries such as electricity, industry, transport and finance a guide for the future. The strategies are bold, but they are also evolutionary and flexible.
Key takeaways:
Sectoral transformations:
- India’s LTS has prioritised six strategic sectors: electricity, transport, urban, industry, carbon dioxide removal and forests. Of these, electricity and industry sectors together account for over three-fourths of India’s CO2 emissions, while rapid changes are happening in the transport and urban systems.
- More renewable power, demand side reductions and a just transition for phase down of coal will be priorities in the electricity sector.
- In transport, India will look to transition to cleaner fuels, increase energy efficiency, and aggressive electrification. The urban transition will focus on material efficiency of buildings.
- The industrial sector will aim to improve energy efficiency, electrification, material efficiency, green hydrogen and decarbonisation of hard-to-abate sectors.
- There is a lot of scepticism about carbon dioxide removal (CDR), but India’s addition of CDR in its LTS shows we are open to new technology and will pilot these for climate change.
- India has a strong forest policy and will continue to protect its forest and expand tree cover to act as a carbon sink.
Finance & investments:
- India has identified finance as a key enabler for its LTS vision. According to a Council on Energy, Environment and Water assessment, India will need $10 trillion to achieve the 2070 net-zero target.
- The LTS has moved beyond this high-level number and done a comprehensive assessment of the finance issue.
- The plan has gauged the country’s financial requirement, potential sources, the importance of mainstreaming of climate finance and international climate finance, and multilateral arrangements for climate finance flows.
- At the same time, India must continue to push developed countries to pay the billions of dollars they promised.
Changes to LiFE:
- LiFE is India’s call for citizens, communities, industry leaders, and policymakers of the world to adopt a lifestyle for the environment.
- The LTS nudges people to make simple yet effective sustainable choices, industries and markets to scale these, and government policies to support them.
- LiFE elevates the importance of individual contribution to the larger climate goal, giving it as much importance as industry and policy level actions, an aspect largely missing from the climate discourse till now.
Research & innovation:
- India’s LTS notes the relevance of research and innovation, and identifies multiple technologies in the energy and industry sectors that need to be explored and scaled up.
- While the emphasis on innovation is great, it only focuses on technology related innovations. Innovations on business models are equally important to push low-carbon technologies.
Adaptation, resilience and international cooperation:
- The LTS emphasises the need for strengthening basic infrastructure like irrigation systems and disaster-resilient buildings, institutional infrastructure for better disaster response, and raising incomes to bolster capabilities of individuals and communities to adapt to the long-term impacts of climate change.
- This needs international cooperation, and multilateral initiatives and platforms.
Shortcomings:
- But, there’s a crucial element missing in India’s long-term strategy.
- It could have included carbon pricing through the emission-trading scheme as a key instrument.
- The Centre has already announced the creation of a domestic carbon market and the Lok Sabha has passed it. This is clearly going to be an important element of India’s strategy, but the LTS is quiet about it.
Conclusion:
- Going forward, India’s strategy should present a mechanism to assess progress towards its intermediate goals and course correct if necessary.
- India has given a clear sense of the list of sectoral interventions as well as the levers it intends to deploy in its path towards net-zero.
- The strategy document was prepared through intensive stakeholder consultations with various government ministries, states, academic institutions and think tanks. This ensured that the final outcome was robust.
Way Forward:
- The next iterations of this document should add more actionable information by proposing prioritisation of sectoral actions based on modelling studies, assessing implications for economic growth and jobs, and the feasibility of various sectoral actions.
- It will help government policies and private markets to move in the desired direction and make the LTS a detailed road map building on the guide presented in Egypt.
