As the man who was entrusted to ensure to move the global effort to tackle climate change forward, Alok Sharma is focused on ensuring countries are working to deliver on their Glasgow pledges. The former UK business minister, who serves as COP26 President is in India on a two-day visit. Among the issues on Sharma’s agenda is the progress on India’s enhanced commitments under the Paris Agreement or nationally determined contributions (NDCs).
At the Leaders’ Summit in Glasgow, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced new targets for renewable energy and emissions intensity for India to meet by 2030. These targets though now part of domestic goals are not yet reflected in India’s international commitments under Paris Agreement.
“One of my asks when I visit in the next few days is to see to where India may be in terms of its own 2030 emission reduction target, and how we were interested in having that discussion,” Sharma told ET.
There has been discussion on the funding required to achieve the goals particularly that of adding 500GW of non-fossil fuel capacity (450GW of renewable and 50GW non-fossil), 50% electricity sourced from renewable sources. Alok Sharma’s meetings with Niti Aayog officials, Environment Minister Bhupendra Yadav, and Power Minister RK Singh will focus on possible partnerships and investments required to achieve these goals.
“India has made very good progress in the last few years”, said Sharma as he rattled off India’s achievements and plans. “In the last ten years India has quadrupled its wind and solar capacity, you got this commitment of net zero emissions from the Indian Railways by 2030. You have seen the work that has gone on in terms of the International Solar Alliance (ISA), Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI), which I co-chaired over past couple of years, then the big commitment of 50% of energy from renewables by 2030, effectively the deployment of that 500GW of installed capacity by 2030 as well”
“These are all big commitments that India has made and I think India, the government, and the Prime Minister deserve a lot of credit,” the COP26 President said. Among the international efforts that India has taken on in partmership with the UK is the greens grids initiative, that is backed by 80 countries.
“There is a lot that India is doing in terms of domestic efforts and in terms international leadership,” Sharma said.
The COP26 president said he would be discussing with counterparts on how to further advance the Green Grids Initiative – One Sun One World One Grid (GGI-OSOWOG), a product of UK-India partnership focused on strengthening global support for green power infrastructure.
With barely four months left for this year’s UN climate talks, much needs to done to keep the world on track to meeting the goals set in Paris and Glasgow. The challenges of the present moment—inflation and debt, energy and food crisis and the geopolitics–and the rising impacts of unchecked global warming being felt across the world are pushing governments. ET’s Urmi A Goswami spoke with COP26 President Alok Sharma on the prospects for climate action.