Coal may singe net-zero journey

Indian policymakers are drawing up an updated climate change pledge to be presented to the UN by early November. The world’s watching closely

- S DINAKAR

India’s international climate commitments are tied to its domestic policies, much like other nations’ — so much so that the government has tried to time reforms in the electricity and emission sectors with its periodic pledges on emission reduction initiatives to the United Nations.

But what threatens to muddle a new round of commitments that promise to scrub the country’s skies partly free of pollutants by 2035 is the rebound of coal as a primary fuel of development.

India plans to submit its Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) to the UNFCCC, the global climate body, by COP 30, the latest edition of the annual climate meeting that is to be held in Brazil next month, a senior government official said. The NDC, a document containing emission reduction targets and action plans — will cover the five-year period ending 2035, after the current NDC expires in 2030.

‘New Delhi has made repeated stabs at reforming the power sector, the country’s biggest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, and on carbon trading mechanisms, both in 2022, when India submitted its first NDC under the Paris Accord, an international climate treaty, and this year prior to the second NDC. Power sector reforms have faced a push-back but the country is ready to launch a Carbon Credit Trading Scheme next year.

“The upcoming Indian Carbon Market is expected to accelerate decarbonisation for the Indian industries and other relevant sectors,” said Pallavi Das and Vaibhav Chaturvedi from Council On Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW), a New Delhi-based leading global climate think tank.

But, unlike in the previous climate round, coal threatens to cloud the prospects of India’s new NDC. In 2022, the country’s new draft power generation plan proposed to add an “additional coal-based capacity of up to 28 Gw by the financial year 2032.” Current plans foresee boosting coal additions to well over 80 Gw.