US-China climate deal a surprise for India

United States and China's agreement to reduce carbon emissions would push countries like India to re-jig its climate strategy but it falls short of driving the world to an ambitious climate agreement in Paris by 2015.

Updated on: Nov 13, 2014, 24:35:41 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

United States and China's agreement to reduce carbon emissions would push countries like India to re-jig its climate strategy but it falls short of driving the world to an ambitious climate agreement in Paris by 2015.

The two biggest carbon emitters of the world - US and China - on Wednesday signed an agreement under which US will cut its emissions by 26-28% of 2005 levels by 2025, and China would peak its carbon emissions by 2030 along with generating 20% of its electricity from zero-emission sources.

The deal will also be a talking point at the G-20 summit in Australia starting from November 15. The European Union, which was first to announce emission cuts of 40% by 2030, has already welcomed the deal but the developing world, including India, was not enthused with the secret agreement, saying it was not enough to have a treaty in Paris to limit the increase in global temperature by 2 degrees by the turn of the century.

"The original base level for reducing emissions for rich nations was 1990 and not 2005 as announced by the US. If one makes calculations, the actual emission reduction by the US will be negligible to the 1990 level," a senior Indian climate negotiator said, who was unwilling to be quoted as India has not officially reacted on the deal.

The US promise, if delivered, would mean its carbon emissions would be at 1990 level, much higher than what it told the world when the Kyoto Protocol was agreed upon in 1998. The US eventually didn't sign the agreement as it failed to get it ratified by its Senate.

India which had indicated distancing itself from China in climate talks on insistence of Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu will now have to come up with an independent stand.

Terming the deal as "smart politics" by the G-2, Navroz K Dubash, a senior fellow at Centre for Policy Research said the reason for hope is that the move really infuses energy into the global process.

The environment ministry will be conducting a series of negotiations with experts from within and outside the government over the next week to strategise for the Lima Climate Summit.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
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.Read More

Follow India news real-time updates and the latest news covered on Hindustan Times, featuring today's critical updates on Sonam Wangchuk LIVE and more across India.