India’s Emissions Targets Not Quite What They Seem
By Paul Homewood
From the Press Trust of India:
India has voluntarily announced efforts to reduce emission intensity by 20-25 per cent by 2020 from the 2005 level without reckoning the emissions from agriculture sector, Lok Sabha was informed today.
Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said during Question Hour that though India was a party to United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol, it did not have legally binding green house gas (GHG) emission reduction commitments.
"However Government has voluntarily announced to reduce emission intensity of Gross Domestic Product by 20-25 per cent by 2020 from the 2005 level," he said.
The government is implementing the National Solar Mission, National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency, National Mission on Sustainable Habitat and Green India Mission under the National Action Plan on Climate change, which are aimed at addressing mitigation of GHG emissions, he said.
Sounds impressive, but what does it all mean?
First let’s look at GDP (in real prices):
| INR | |
| 2005 | 57188 |
| 2013 | 99965 |
| 2020 Projected | 166241 |
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/india/gross-national-product
http://www.statista.com/statistics/263617/gross-domestic-product-gdp-growth-rate-in-india/
https://www.gfmag.com/global-data/country-data/india-gdp-country-report
CDIAC give the following figures for CO2 emissions (in MtC):
| MtC | |
| 2005 | 385 |
| 2013 | 657 |
If CO2 intensity remains at 2005 levels, emissions would be 1119 MtC by 2020. A reduction of 20% would therefore bring this down to 895 MtC.
In other words, an increase of 36% from 2013 levels, (the latest available data).
This increase of 238 MtC/year compares with the UK’s annual emissions of 126 MtC.
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
India’s government has the situation well in hand. Their prime concern is pulling the hundreds of million out of poverty, and the fastest way to do that is to grow energy supply as quickly and as inexpensively as possible. That requires the use of fossil fuels. Whatever else is said or done about renewables, it will be full speed ahead for fossil fuel use.
What you say is true, but the reporting on this since they appear to have gone green with the buzz words— “The government is implementing the National Solar Mission, National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency, National Mission on Sustainable Habitat and Green India Mission under the National Action Plan on Climate change, which are aimed at addressing mitigation of GHG emissions” will be that another government has caved to the UN.
Only words. Time will tell. I do believe they will invest in renewables, but not at near the scale the CO2ists would like. India’s announcement that emissions intensity of GDP as a reasonable measure is a clue.
This is the exact same gambit the Chinese pulled about 7 or 8 years ago.
A lot of this can be accomplished simply by shifting GDP mix toward services like IT outsourcing, or textiles (Birla) or pharmaceuticals (Ranbaxy), or healthcare (‘medical tourism’). In the 1990’s MOT went from 0 to over 8000 software engineers in two India centers in just two years.
An interesting psychological things happens with ratios. In most people’s heads the numerator is the variable and the denominator as the constant or a base thing. The Indians have used this nicely.
Good, more CO2 returned to the shorter term carbon cycle. 🙂
Now we need a couple of the South African state to start using their large amounts of coal to build their development.
Push that CO2 level up …. TOWARDS 700ppm 🙂
I am fond of prime numbers so the 7 (of 700) just seems good. I too have suggested 700 for the reason that this level does provide a reserve or cushion. If the ppm can go up by 2 per year it can also go down by 2 per year. Some say that 150 – 180 is the critical low number, so if we start down we don’t really have far to go.
I first used the “Towards 700ppm” tag in a post in response to a 350.org idiot.
Upset him no end, guy had a proverbial melt-down.. hilarious.
… so I have continued to use it. 🙂
Many government agencies write a budget for next year that is, say, 10% above the current year. When the agency only gets a 4% increase the press release will say “Your beloved Agency XYZ has had a budget cut of 6%.” This is dishonest.
India uses creative rhetoric.
This is not dishonest.
Useful data, Paul – thanks. This isn’t new anyway. These are the same intensity reduction figures as were published last year by Globe International: http://globelegislators.org/publications/legislation/climate Select ‘Asia and Oceania’ and ‘India’ and download ‘Extract’. (They were discussed here some months ago.) Note that China’s announced intensity reduction is 40-45% by 2020 (from 2005 level).