Climate talks in Paris: The need for an ambitious but equitable agreement

World leaders meet today in Paris, not to discuss terrorism, but to discuss another of our generation's biggest threat, climate change. It is clear that already, when temperatures have risen by less than 1°C, over pre-industrial era, the world is seeing weird and devastating weather events. In India, farmers are hit again and again with unseasonal rain, hail and extreme rain and temperatures, which is crippling their livelihoods, driving them to destitution and even death. Therefore, Paris needs to arrive at an effective and ambitious agreement to reduce emissions and to keep the world below the 2°C rise guardrail - an increase that is seen to be least risky and most attainable today.

But we also know that limiting the rise of temperatures also limits the amount of carbon dioxide that can be emitted in the atmosphere. So, Paris is about an agreement to share the global carbon budget. The fact is that in spite of all the talk and all the rhetoric, the world has still not delinked growth from emissions. This is the really inconvenient truth - not what former US president Al Gore made famous through his film on climate change.

The stakes are high. In Paris, the very terms of the global climate agreement will change. Instead of requiring countries to cut emission based on their contribution to creating the problem, each country can decide how much it will cut. Furthermore, all countries are required to take action, not just the countries, which are responsible for the bulk of emissions in the atmosphere. In this way, the firewall, which differentiated between the developed world responsible for climate change and the countries, which needed right to development, will be removed. In this way, equity and differentiation will be erased.

But this is not all. The UN has accepted that the Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC) - actions submitted by all countries to reduce emissions by 2030 - will take the world to at least 2.7°C rise, if not much more. So, the world must also agree to how it will ratchet up the commitments of all countries to cut emissions further. This is where the real rub lies. How will it share the carbon budget?




According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, to keep the world below 2°C, with a 66 per cent probability, the budget is some 2,900 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide between 1870 and 2100. The industrialized countries have emitted the bulk of the 1900 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The world is left with 1000 billion tonnes. The aim of the INDC is to surreptitiously appropriate the carbon budget. The US, for instance, has already used up some 21 per cent of the used carbon budget. Between now and 2030, as per its lacklustre INDC, it will take up another 8-10 per cent. In this way the INDC is not just a country's commitment to reduce emissions, it is its intention to occupy global carbon space. Once this space is taken, it is difficult to vacate.

The only way now to operationalize equity is to make sure that all countries are required to take actions to reduce emissions based on the fair share of the carbon budget. But rich industrialized world do not want this discussed.

This is why western media has started an orchestrated campaign to paint India, which is asking for a fair share, as the climate villain.

But this is why India must set the narrative straight. We are not climate deniers - we are worst impacted by climate change. We are taking action to reduce emissions. India's INDC is more ambitious than the US in terms of moving towards non-fossil fuels. The US in 2030, will have only 30 per cent non-fossil in its energy mix, we have committed to 40 per cent. The US even today has more per capita consumption of coal and its switch to natural gas means that it is moving away from renewables. The fact is that natural gas is only marginally cleaner than dirty coal. It keeps the US locked into fossil fuels.

So, Paris is not just about an agreement to cut emissions, it is also about how the world will operationalize equity. Otherwise, socialist France will preside over climate apartheid.

(The writer is the director general of Centre for Science and Environment)