India Resists Carbon Cuts With Climate Plan
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New Delhi — India, the world’s fourth-largest emitter of carbon dioxide, plans to form eight commissions to promote solar power, energy efficiency, and water conservation as it seeks to mitigate damage from the changing climate.
The proposals are part of a national plan to address global warming, the government said in 47-page document unveiled in New Delhi yesterday. Each so-called mission will devise a state-funded plan and have authority to carry it out, the prime minister’s special envoy for climate change, Shyam Saran, told reporters yesterday.
India, China, and other developing nations have asked industrialized countries to carry the burden of reducing CO2 and other greenhouse gases through adopting emissions targets by 2020. They also seek aid and technology to cut their own CO2 output. India has resisted adopting limits so its economy can grow enough to eliminate poverty. About 34% of the nation’s 1.1 billion people live on less than $1 a day, the U.N. has estimated.
“This does demonstrate that we are prepared to be responsible global citizens and join others in a collaborative effort to deal with climate change,” Mr. Saran said about the new commissions.
Each of the eight panels will have an institutional structure consisting of government departments, industry experts, academics, and citizen representatives, the government said.
India, like other developing countries, has no emissions limits under the Kyoto treaty to stem global warming and has rejected adopting goals without financial and technical help.
“Sustainable development has to be supported by both financial resources and technological resources,” Mr. Saran said. “Until that happens, how do you expect the developing countries to take up quantitative restrictions?”
The world’s second-most populous country rejected in April an international proposal to replace national limits on carbon- dioxide pollution set by Kyoto with targets for individual industries, taking sides against Japan and America in how to curb global warming.
India is opposed to suggestions by the world’s two largest economies to adopt a so-called “bottom-up, sectoral approach” devised by Japan in its bid to lead the crafting of a successor to Kyoto.
