Skip to main content

UK report warns: India likely to turn into world's No 2 carbon dioxide emitter by 2030

A fresh international alert has come at a time when Prime Minister Narendra Modi begins his first UK visit: A study carried out by three top scholars for the London School of Economics (LSE) has said that at 8.6 per cent rate of growth officially projected by the Government of india, the country is all set to emit 9,285 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per annum by 2030, next only to that of China.
The study, titled “Intended nationally determined contributions: what are the implications for greenhouse gas emissions in 2030?”, by Rodney Boyd, Joe Cranston Turner and Bob Ward, said that such high emission would come even if India achieves the target of 33–35% improvement in emissions intensity by 2030.
China, which will be No 1 polluter, on the other hand, would be emitting nearly double CO2 than that of India –16,256 million tonnes –if its official growth projections of 7 per cent till 2020 and 5.33 per cent between 2020 and 2030. The European Union is projected to emit 3,126 million tonnes of CO2 by 2030, Japan 1,008 million tonnes of CO2, and the United States 4,028 million tonnes of CO2 emission.
The revelation comes even as Modi is likely to ask UK officials to share breakthroughs in renewable energy and other ‘clean’ technologies and for help financing a huge expansion in efficiency and solar and wind power. India finds this particularly essential, as it has pledged before the United Nations to increase carbon and other greenhouse gas emissions more slowly than the economy grows.
Meanwhile, the International Energy Agency in its just-released annual report has warned, “A rapidly expanding energy sector could exacerbate already serious challenges with water stress and local air pollution: integrated policies on land use and urbanisation (the 'smart cities' initiative), pollution controls, technology development, and a relentless focus on energy efficiency can mitigate these risks and avoid locking in an inefficient capital stock.”
It said, this scenario is particularly significant in the context of the fact that one in five of India’s population – 240 million people – “still lacks access to electricity”, and meeting India’s energy “needs requires a huge commitment of capital and constant vigilance as to the implications for energy security and the environment”.
The IEA report insisted, “Pressing ahead with the overhaul of India’s energy regulatory framework is critical to secure the estimated $2.8 trillion of investment that is needed in energy supply to 2040”, adding,  “three-quarters of this investment” will go to the power sector, “which needs to almost quadruple in size to keep up with projected electricity demand, but which remains beset for now by high network losses and high financial losses among the local distribution utilities.
According to the IEA report, “The expansion of coal supply makes India the second-largest coal producer in the world, but also, already by 2020, the world’s largest coal importer, overtaking Japan, the EU and China.” 

Comments

TRENDING

Patriot, Link: How Soviet imbroglio post-1968 crucially influenced alternative media platforms

Adatata Narayanan, Aruna Asaf Ali Alternative media, as we know it today in the age of information and communication technology (ICT), didn't exist in the form it does today during or around the time I joined formal journalism at Link Newsweekly as a sub-editor in January 1979. However, Link, and its sister publication Patriot, a daily—both published from Delhi—were known to have provided what could be called an alternative media platform at a time when major Delhi-based dailies were controlled by media barons.

60 crore in Mahakumbh? It's all hype with an eye on UP polls, asserts keen BJP supporter in Amit Shah's constituency

As the Mahakumbh drew to a close, during my daily walk, I met a veteran BJP supporter—a neighbor with whom we would often share dinner in a group. An amicable person, the first thing he asked me, as he was about to take the lift to his flat, was, "How many people do you think must have participated in the holy dip?" He then stopped by to talk—which we did for a full half-hour, cutting into my walk time.

Breaking news? Top Hindu builder ties up with Muslim investor for a huge minority housing society in Ahmedabad

There is a flutter in Ahmedabad's Vejalpur area, derogatorily referred to as the "border" because, on its eastern side, there is a sprawling minority area called Juhapura, where around five lakh Muslims live. The segregation is so stark that virtually no Muslim lives in Vejalpur, populated by around four lakh Hindus, and no Hindu lives in Juhapura.

Morari Bapu echoes misleading figures to support the BJP's anti-conversion agenda

A senior Gujarat activist phoned me today to inform me that the well-known storyteller on Lord Ram, Morari Bapu, has made an "unsubstantiated" and "preposterous" statement in Songadh town, located in the tribal-dominated Tapi district. He claimed that while the Gujarat government wants the Bhagavad Gita to be taught in schools, the "problem is" that 75% of government teachers "are Christians who do not let this happen" and are “involved in religious conversions.”

An untold story? Still elusive: Gujarati language studies on social history of Gujarat's caste and class evolution

This is a follow-up to my earlier blog , where I mentioned that veteran scholar Prof. Ghanshyam Shah has just completed a book for publication on a topic no academic seems to have dealt with—caste and class relations in Gujarat’s social history. He forwarded me a chapter of the book, published as an "Economic & Political Weekly" article last year, which deals with the 2015 Patidar agitation in the context of how this now-powerful caste originated in the Middle Ages and how it has evolved in the post-independence era.

Caste, class, and Patidar agitation: Veteran academic 'unearths' Gujarat’s social history

Recently, I was talking with a veteran Gujarat-based academic who is the author of several books, including "Social Movements in India: A Review of Literature", "Untouchability in Rural India", "Public Health and Urban Development: The Study of Surat Plague", and "Dalit Identity and Politics", apart from many erudite articles and papers in research and popular journals.

Justifying social divisions? 'Dogs too have caste system like we humans, it's natural'

I have never had any pets, nor am I very comfortable with them. Frankly, I don't know how to play with a pet dog. I just sit quietly whenever I visit someone and see their pet dog trying to lick my feet. While I am told not to worry, I still choose to be a little careful, avoiding touching the pet.

New York-based digital company traces Modi's meteoric rise to global Hindutva ecosystem over several decades

A recent document, released by the Polis Project Inc.—a New York-based digital magazine and hybrid research and journalism organization—even as seeking to highlight the alleged rise of authoritarianism in India, has sought to trace Prime Minister Narendra Modi's meteoric rise since 2014 to the ever-expanding global Hindutva ecosystem over the last several decades.

What's wrong with those seeking to promote Sanskrit? An ex-Hindi professor has the answer

Ajay Tiwari  I have always wondered why certain elite sections are so fascinated by Sanskrit, to the extent of even practicing speaking a language that, for all practical purposes, isn’t alive. During my Times of India stint in Gandhinagar, the Gujarat state capital, I personally witnessed an IAS bureaucrat, Bhagyesh Jha, trying to converse with a friend in Sanskrit.