From optimism the first day, the Paris climate talks descended into scepticism on Wednesday with negotiators shoehorning new agenda for a likely international agreement to cope with global warming.
Prime minister Narendra Modi delivers a speech during the opening session of the World Climate Change Conference 2015 (COP21) at Le Bourget. (REUTERS Photo)
Laurent Fabius, French foreign minister and president of the conference, expressed concern over the “slow pace” of negotiations in the different auxiliary groups with each one discussing a contentious issue for the Paris deal.
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Indian representatives said differences between various teams have widened since Monday when 154 heads of state struck a conciliatory note.
“I will urge the negotiators to speed up the resolution of differences to have a text for political discussion starting next week,” the minister told reporters.
Fabius has asked interlocutors to submit a “consensus” draft by Saturday for final discussions by ministers next week.
Among contentious issues are the review mechanism for climate action plan 2030 of every country, higher ambition from the developed world and a clear road map for climate finance after 2020. While rich countries have committed $100 billion by 2020, they have not promised anything beyond that period.
“We are still at an early stage where there are difficulties and possibility of resolution. It is too early in the day to say what would be there in the final agreement,” said Ajay Mathur, chief spokesperson of India’s climate negotiating team. “We are here to negotiate and we are talking to narrow down differences”.
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He also said India was willing to reduce its carbon emissions from coal, provided rich countries pay for faster adoption of cleaner technologies. Mathur argued that more foreign money would reduce the capital expenditure for investors in the renewable sector.
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He also said India was willing to reduce its carbon emissions from coal, provided rich countries pay for faster adoption of cleaner technologies. Mathur argued that more foreign money would reduce the capital expenditure for investors in the renewable sector.
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His remarks came on a day the World Health Organization warned that carbon emissions from coal-fired plants were contributing to massive pollution in countries like India and there was growing disappointment against New Delhi’s refusal to reduce dependence on coal for its energy needs.
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.
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