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Climate change and the Indian stand

The position taken by India on climate change at the recently concluded G8 Summit in L’Aquila, Italy, has triggered an unseemly controversy. It is over India signing the declaration of the Major Economies Forum (MEF) on Energy and Climate that was held alongside the Summit. (Since 2007, besides the G8 (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the U.K., and the U.S.), the Summit has included the five Outreach Countries (the G5) comprising Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa. The 17 members constituting the MEF are the G8, the G5 and Australia, the European Union, Indonesia and South Korea.)

The declaration includes the following key statement on limiting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. “We recognise the scientific view that the increase in global average temperature above pre-industrial levels ought not to exceed 2 degrees C. In this regard … we will work between now and [the 15th Conference of the Parties (COP-15) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in December 2009 at] Copenhagen … to identify a global goal for substantially reducing emissions by 2050.” By endorsing this statement, critics say India has admitted a cap on its emissions, which would affect our development, and it is a compromise on the stand India has taken all along that it will not accept any legally binding limit on its emissions.

On its own, of course, the MEF statement does not imply any cap on countries like India. It has to be read along with the following statement of the G8, which India has not signed. (Note the near identical language used in the first sentence of the two statements.) “We recognise the broad scientific view that the increase in global average temperature above pre-industrial levels ought not to exceed 2 deg. C. Because this global challenge can only be met by a global response, we reiterate our willingness to share with all countries the goal of achieving at least a 50 per cent reduction of global emissions by 2050, recognising that [it] implies that global emissions need to peak as soon as possible and decline thereafter. As part of this, we also support a goal of developed countries reducing emissions of GHGs in aggregate by 80 per cent or more compared to 1990, or more recent years. Consistent with this ambitious long-term objective, we will undertake robust aggregate and individual mid-term reductions, taking into account that baselines may vary … Similarly major economies need to undertake quantifiable actions to collectively reduce emissions significantly below business-as-usual (BAU) by a specified year.” The G8 Chair stressed in his summary that “active engagement of all major emitting countries through quantifiable mitigation actions” was “an indispensable condition to successfully tackle climate change” (emphasis added).

COP-15 is expected to arrive at suitable amendments to the Kyoto Protocol for the industrialised countries (the 40 Annex-1 countries of the Protocol that include 13 economies in transition) to undertake new emission reduction targets beyond the first commitment period of 2008-2012. The Protocol required that Annex-1 countries reduce their overall emissions by 5 per cent below the 1990 levels by 2012. Sadly, however, the GHG emissions of the non-EIT Annex-1 countries, which today account for three-fourths of the accumulated emissions and thereby have a historical responsibility, have actually increased by over 10 per cent compared to the baseline year.

For stabilising atmospheric GHG concentration that limits temperature rise to 2 degrees, the Annex-1 countries need to undertake deep cuts in their emissions during the second commitment period, which as yet remains undefined. The Annex-1 countries, on the other hand, want emerging economies like India and China, whose emissions have grown in recent years because of their economic growth, also to accept significant legally binding cuts during this period.

However, the goal of 50 per cent reduction in current global emissions by 2050 will not suffice to limit global warming to 2 degrees. According to the 4th Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) of 2007, only a global 85 per cent reduction (from 2000 levels) will have a high chance of preventing a 2-degree increase. Let us see how the arithmetic works on this basis. The current world per capita emission (PCE) is 4.48 t of CO{-2} equivalent per year. An 85 per cent reduction means that PCE should drop to 0.67 t of CO{-2}eq per year by 2050. India’s PCE is around 1.2 t per year while the average of the Annex-1 countries is 10 t.

The Annex-1 countries should, therefore, cut their emissions by 93.3 per cent by 2050. Such a drastic reduction by the industrialised countries is unlikely to happen. Anything less would automatically imply a significant curtailment of aggregate emissions of the developing countries so that warming remains below 2 degrees. This essentially means there would be severe limits on the emissions of China and India, the first and the fourth ranked emitters at present. Then the italicised phrases, ‘quantifiable’ and ‘by a specified year,’ in the G8 statement, have the implication of setting targets. The apprehension of the critics is that though the G8 and MEF statements are not legally binding, these could form the basis for the Copenhagen negotiations towards an agreement for the post-2012 phase.

“We do not regard this [as] an arithmetical target,” Shyam Saran, former Foreign Secretary and currently India’s Special Envoy to the Prime Minister and Chief negotiator in the Climate Change talks, has been quoted as saying. “We regard this as a political decision because there is a great deal of uncertainty with respect to what would be the actual rise in temperature, what would be the consequences of that rise in temperature,” he said. “It could be 1.5, 2 or 2.5 degrees but for international negotiations to make progress, you need some numbers,” said J. Srinivasan, a climate change researcher at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. “Also how the system will respond remains uncertain. But we know that the impact would be severe somewhere around this region; whether it is 1.5 or 2 will play itself out in time,” he added.

Mr. Saran has also stated how the government interpreted the phrase ‘meaningful deviation’ in the MEF statement. “Developing countries have already committed themselves to deviation from their BAU trajectories provided this is supported and enabled by financing, technology and capacity building by developed countries. This is fully reflected in the declaration and the addition of the adjective ‘meaningful’ does not change the nature of the bargain.”

The implication of the MEF statement, which India has signed, is as much a cap on India’s emissions as the proposal by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at the 2007 Heiligendamm G8 Summit that India’s PCE will not exceed that of industrialised countries at any point of time — the ‘Singh Convergence Principle (SCP)’. Interestingly, that never generated any controversy even though it can constrain India’s emissions more severely. If the Annex-1 countries were to set their “robust aggregate and individual mid-term reductions” and accordingly switch to a low carbon path very quickly, the SCP would imply an automatic constraint on India’s emissions. It would dictate India’s peaking period, the peak value and the rate of fall to the desired universal convergence value.

The G8 declaration, however, does not specify any mid-term target. The accompanying ‘Political Declaration’ by the G5, issued a day earlier, however, demanded a 40 per cent cut by developed nations by 2020. If the Annex-1 countries were to accept that, India would be constrained to peak to 6 t some time before 2020 itself. Such a rapid high carbon growth would then imply a sharp drop to be consistent with the SCP. The cost of such a high rate of mitigation would be far greater than the more desirable path of gradual peaking to a lower sustainable value and a gradual drop towards convergence.

From all perspectives, the SCP is an eminently sensible proposition. On the one hand, it forces developed countries to cut their emissions and, on the other, takes India on a low carbon path. It automatically constrains India’s emissions if the developed countries are serious about cutting their emissions. Thus the SCP serves to deflect fingers pointing at India for not cutting down on emissions even as it demonstrates the country’s seriousness of intent. Based as it is on per capita emissions, it also reflects the national position of equal access for all to the atmospheric commons.

Efforts by the Indian negotiators in reiterating this powerful principle would, however, seem to have been wanting at the Summit. Both the SCP and the present stand at G8/MEF (which, however, lacks the reciprocity of the SCP) only imply the desirable goal of committing India to a low carbon growth path. But they are far from being legally binding and their implications for Copenhagen will depend on how developing countries are able to force developed countries to keep their side of the bargain.

Corrections and Clarifications

Russia was left out of the list of countries that form the G8. The first paragraph of "Climate change and the Indian stand" (Editorial page, July 28, 2009) listed them as Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the U.K., and the U.S.

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