CLIMATE TARGET 2030

Recently, India has enhanced its climate change targets for 2030.

The Prime Minister of India made a number of new commitments to strengthen climate action from India at UNFCCC COP 26 (Click on the blue link to understand all about COP 26 and Climate Change before going through this topic) in Glasgow in 2021.

Revised target

Emission Intensity:

• India currently pledges to reduce GDP emissions intensity (emissions per unit of GDP) by at least 45% from 2005 levels.
• Currently, a 33–35 per cent reduction was the goal.

Energy generation

• India has also committed to making sure that by 2030, at least half of its installed energy generation capacity will be based on non-fossil fuel sources.
• This is higher than the current objective of 40%.

Significance of this move

• The revised Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) aim to increase India's contributions to the Paris Agreement's goal of strengthening the international response to the challenge of climate change.
• The NDCs represent each nation's efforts to lower national emissions and prepare for the effects of climate change.
• Such a move will also assist India in establishing growth routes with minimal emissions.
• The highest level of commitment to decoupling economic growth from greenhouse gas emissions will be shown by India's new NDCs.
• The Net Zero target by 2030 set by Indian Railways alone will result in a yearly emissions reduction of 60 million tonnes as a result of the updated NDCs.

Other targets

• Increase non-fossil energy capacity to 500 GW (gigawatts) by 2030.
• Reduce the total projected carbon emissions by 1 billion tonnes (BT) by 2030.
• Achieve net zero carbon by 2070

Initiative toward climate change

Reforms in the transportation sector:

• With the Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of (Hybrid &) Electric Vehicles Scheme, India is hastening the adoption of e-mobility.
• The present programmes are supplemented by a voluntary vehicle scrapping policy to phase out outdated and unsafe automobiles.

Support for EVs in India:

• India is one of a small number of nations that back the global EV30@30 movement, which seeks to have at least 30% of new vehicle sales be electric by 2030.
• At the UNFCCC COP26 in Glasgow, India endorsed the "Panchamrit" or five elements for combating climate change.

Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana

• It has assisted 88 million people in switching from coal-based cooking fuel to LPG connections, which is the role of government programmes.

The mission of hydrogen energy

• To concentrate on producing hydrogen using renewable energy sources.

Perform, Achieve, and Trade (PAT)

• It is a market-based approach that aims to both accelerate and reward energy efficiency in major energy-intensive businesses.

What are the Important Highlights of UNFCCC COP 26?

Glasgow, UK hosted the 26th Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in 2021.

Agenda of meeting

• New International and National Goals:
• The Glasgow Summit asked nations to think about enhancing their 2030 goals by COP27, which will be held in Egypt in 2022.
• The summit's goal was to limit global warming to +1.5°C, and it succeeded in persuading around 140 nations to set goals for achieving net-zero emissions by specific dates.
• The accomplishment is notable because, according to the Paris Agreement, poor nations only agreed to cut the "emissions-intensity" of GDP, not emissions.
• India has likewise declared its 2070 net-zero goal and joined the agreement.???????

Agenda for Glasgow's Breakthrough:

The Glasgow Breakthrough Agenda, supported by 42 countries, is a potentially significant development that came out of COP26 (but outside of the COP framework) (including India).

Reduced Coal Use:

• Because coal is the dirtiest fossil fuel, it should be phased out as soon as possible.
• Developing nations have rejected the European Union's strong drive for its phase-out.
• At the COP26, a "phase-down" of coal-based electricity was referred to as the intermediate road, as proposed by India.

The ideal case scenario

• According to a preliminary analysis by the independent organization Climate Action Tracker (CAT), the declared targets, if completely attained, could keep global warming to a maximum of +1.8°C.
• The targets for 2030 are not sufficiently aggressive, it further cautions. Global temperature increases of 2.1°C to 2.4°C are more likely to occur unless severe restrictions are put in place.