India’s Roadmap to the utopia of Net Zero Emission

Saksham Misra, Asst. Professor IIL shares with Realty+ his perspective on India’s dilemma of its commitment towards becoming net zero emitter, while fostering country’s economic growth. In the ongoing COP 26 at Glasgow, India has made strong commitments for mitigating the climate change effects. Prime Minister Modi has outlined five pronged commitments called “Panchamrita”. This includes the overhauling declaration of India reaching net zero emission by 2070. The net zero emission means a state in which the greenhouse gases emitted in the atmosphere are balanced by the removal out of the atmosphere. No doubt, net zero emission is a utopia for nations to achieve, but it is equally complex and challenging task. Talking in the context of India; it feeds the second largest population in the world and it is predicted that in coming years, India’s energy demands will increase to foster its fast growing economy and developmental plans. India’s total energy consumption for the year 2019-20 includes, around 43.86% from coal and 32.76 % from crude petroleum products. Electricity sector remains the biggest consumer of Indian raw coal and lignite. This clearly shows India is heavily reliant on carbon based energy resources which is a harsh fact. Although this has reduced, but not significantly. Now, if I put things in perspective then India is at a dilemma, where at one end it has to observe its commitments for becoming net zero emitter, and on the other it needs reliable supplies of energy to foster its economic growth. This simply means that the utopia of net zero is relatively more arduous for India then its developing counterpart. But despite this dilemma, India has potential for accomplishing the utopia of net zero and what it needs is a strong infrastructure base to support the transitioning of its energy systems. India’s current energy infrastructure is fossil fuel and coal centered, therefore policy makers need to make bold decisions for decommissioning and replacing them with cleaner ones. Apart from this India needs to invest more in development of sustainable infrastructures especially in construction and manufacturing sectors. I have cherry picked four important measures, which are crucial for developing sustainable energy infrastructure which can help in achieving net zero utopia these are –

1. India needs to strategically reduce its reliance on carbon based resources specially coal. For this it needs to expand its installed renewable capacity, develop a resilient grid network and increase electricity storage capacity. This will help in developing reliable supply of electricity, which is often an issue with renewable based electricity supply.
2. The major chunk of coal based electricity is used to power the cement, steel plants and other construction related activities. India needs to make its construction and manufacturing sectors more sustainable and greener. It needs to decommission coal powered manufacturing units and replace it with solar or wind. This also becomes relevant because today global consumers prefer carbon clean products and countries are imposing carbon tax on imports. Therefore India needs to realign its construction and manufacturing sectors with international trends of sustainability and environment friendliness.
3. All these measures are feasible only with heavy upfront investments. Therefore, it is important for Indian policy makers to promote investments in climate friendly infrastructure projects. It is equally important to simplify the regulatory and administrative process, which often discourages foreign investors. So broadly if I may put it there needs to be a positive ecosystem for investing in climate friendly infrastructure.
4. I strongly feel that developing countries like India cannot fully rely on developed world for transfer and sharing of technologies. The harsh reality of international relations is that countries actions are guided by their self-interests. Therefore, India has to develop its technology and invest in research & development. I am not pessimist about international cooperation but post pandemic India should be “Aatm Nirbhar”.

Lastly I feel it is important to conclude with a caveat that this transition from carbon to clean energy systems should not carry forward the legacy of unequal development. Therefore, I would strongly argue for adding the prefix “Just” “Net Zero Emission”. This means that the benefits and costs of becoming net zero must be equally distributed among different stakeholders especially among the have and have not’s of Indian society.