Reworking Net-zero For Climate Justice

Achievements of India: in context of Paris Agreement-

• India will meet its Paris Agreement target for 2030.
• Its per­-capita emissions are a third of the global average, and it will in future remain within its share of ecological space.

Background to the concept of climate justice: In 2015, at the UN General Assembly when the Sustainable Development Agenda 2030 was adopted and at the Paris Conference, Prime Minister Narendra Modi stressed a reframing of climate change to climate justice.

• The Paris Agreement explicitly recognise this justice by acknowledging that peaking will take longer for such countries and is to be achieved in the context of sustainable development.
• Unfortunately, this balance is now being upset for a common target and timetable.

Issues in Climate Justice:

• Treat Inequity:
  • Annual emissions make India the fourth largest emitter, even though the climate is impacted by cumulative emissions, with India contributing a mere 3% (26%- the United States and 13% - China).
  • According to United Nations, the richest 1% of the global population emits more than two times the emissions of the bottom 50%.
• Limitations of politicised climate negotiations: Longer-term goals without a strategy to achieve them, as in the case of finance and technology, the transfer fails to make any ground changes.
  • For e.g. The focus on physical quantities, emissions of carbon dioxide and increase in global temperature measures impacts on nature, whereas solutions require an analysis of drivers, trends and patterns of resource use.
• Overlooking development aspirations of developing countries: Global policy recommendations for developing countries are based on achieving ‘reasonable’ not ‘comparable’ levels of well-being.
  • The different means to achieve the goals are not on the agenda because the rising prosperity of the world’s poor does not endanger the planet.
• Endangers the role of infrastructure: Because of its young population and late development, much of the future emissions in India will come from infrastructure, buildings and industry
  • More than half of the cumulative global emissions arose from infrastructure, essential for urban well-being.
  • Infrastructural inequity: No substitute for cement, steel and construction material, and worldwide they will need half the available carbon space till 2050.

Way forward: New framework and new understanding for climate justice.

• Reframing of global concern: In terms of sustainable development for countries with per capita emissions below global average, in line with Paris Agreement.
• Verifiable measure should be well-being within ecological limits.
• International cooperation: Should centre on sharing technology of electric vehicles and hydrogen as a fuel, as they are most effective response to climate change.
• Introduce new variables:
  • Meat Consumption: Consumption of meat contributes to a third of global emissions. Indians eat just 4 kg a year compared with around 68 kg per person for the European Union and twice that in the U.S. where a third of the food is wasted by households.
  • Transport emissions: Which account for a quarter of global emissions, surpassed emissions from generation of electricity in U.S., but are not on global agenda.
  • Coal use: Coal accounts for a quarter of global energy use, India with abundant reserves and per-capita electricity use that is a tenth that of the U.S. is under pressure to stop using coal, even though U.S. currently uses more coal.