Beißen Gedanken: DTE ON THE WEB

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CSE's Fortnightly News Bulletin (January 6, 2015)

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Welcome to 2015, and to the year's first issue of Down To Earth. One where climate change rules. But there are other things afoot which we have an eye on. The 102nd Indian Science Congress has kicked off in Mumbai, and kickstarted a raging debate on ancient Indian science and what it can or cannot do. The news media is reporting it in faintly sarcastic and suggestive undertones, and stories of Indian planes flying to other planets way before the world had seen a plane might be triggering sniggers among some readers. Just a month back, quite like the providential curtain-raiser, Down To Earth had put together a web special on the subject -- and the magazine's investigations do place a question mark on some of the claims and stories (see link below). Amidst all this hullabaloo, the one question that some of us may ask is, what exactly is this ancient Indian science? Public perception of the subject is vague, and its votaries draw from sources as diverse as the Mahabharata and the Vedas. Maybe what this debate really tells us is that it's time we examined this subject more minutely and in-depth, primarily to separate the fact from the fiction.

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HIGHLIGHTS OF THIS FORTNIGHT

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- Editorial: On India's climate strategy, by Sunita Narain

- Cover Story: What happened in Lima

- DTE/Other stories: Mapping climate change in India -- a region-by-region info-feast

- DTE Web Special: What to expect in 2015 -- a list of key forthcoming developments

- DTE Web Special: Looking back -- 2014 rewind

- DTE Web Special: Indian scientific tamper -- examining the claims of politicians about the scientific achievements of ancient India

- From Gobar Times: The rural-to-urban switch -- on the rural exodus to cities

- Learning with CSE: A unique workshop on visual communication and new media

- About to hit the stands: Annual State of India's Environment Report 2015

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EDITORIAL

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India’s climate strategy needs revision

By Sunita Narain

Climate change negotiations are by now predictable. The already-industrialised come to each conference of the parties (COP) with a clear game plan, that is, to erase their contribution to the emissions already present in the atmosphere, thereby effectively remove the differentiation between their responsibility and that of the rest of the world to act. This would rewrite the 1992 convention on climate change and let them evade the obligation to provide funds and technology for action in the developing world. The problem is that developing countries do not come with an equally clear plan or proactive position. As a result, in each meeting, including the recently concluded COP20 at Lima, developing countries lose. The terms of the agreement change progressively and deliberately against the poor and the Planet.

Indian negotiators believe they can maintain the status quo and delay any new agreement, but as climate negotiations show, this tactic does not work. We block but the rich countries shove and the ground slips from under our feet. We need to revise our strategy.

For instance, India went to the Lima COP all guns blazing to oppose ex-ante review of mitigation commitments. It has been decided that all countries will declare their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs)—how much emissions they will cut, why and when. The ex-ante review is to measure and review whether a country has met its target. It is also to see if the sum of these actions is sufficient to keep the world below the guardrail of 2°C increase in temperature. If not, then to decide on further action.

Why did India oppose this? Because when the idea was first proposed at the Copenhagen conference in 2009, it was definitely unacceptable. The proposal was to move the world from setting mandatory carbon dioxide reduction targets to voluntary action. Under the target approach, the world would decide on the carbon budget—how much can it emit and still stay below 2°C rise—and then set targets for each country, based on past contributions to greenhouse gases. Under the voluntary approach, countries would decide how much emission they would (or could) cut. These

commitments would be ex-ante reviewed.

India rightly fought the obliteration of the principle of differentiation, which meant targets would be based on equity and past responsibility. The review was also seen as a dilution of national sovereignty.

But that was the past. Since then India has agreed that the post-2020 climate agreement is not just applicable to all countries, but that all will take voluntary mitigation commitments (called contributions) which will be domestic actions. So, it has already tacitly agreed to dilute the principle of differentiation. The only peg it is hanging its hopes on is that all this action will be done under the principles of the convention, which inscribe equity. But in this new regime, India has to be proactive and nimble to operationalise the principle of equity.If it wanted to do this, India could have proposed to hold the rich accountable for their commitments through the ex-ante review. In this way, each country’s domestic contribution would include an equity metrics of its per capita emissions and the carbon space it will occupy. This contribution and subsequent action would be reviewed before the post-2020 climate change agreement is signed so that targets can be revised to take into account ambition and fairness. This way we not only keep the world safe, but also ensure that each country’s actions are based on rightly shared common atmosphere.

Instead at COP20, India decided to stand with China, which has a definite interest in opposing the ex-ante review because it aims at peaking its emissions by 2030. China has already dumped us and moved on. Under an agreement with the US, it has agreed to match its emissions with that of the US at a massive 12 tonnes per capita per year in 2030. The two big polluters will appropriate the bulk of the carbon space, leaving nothing for the growth of the rest of the developing world.

In the Lima Call for Action, there is no provision for ex-ante review. Now countries will provide information about how their INDCs will be fair and ambitious, but in light of national circumstances. We have no mechanism to ensure that the commitments by the rich countries are equitable, and not crippled by what countries can do. In the final communiqué in Lima, even the basic principle of equity—common but differentiated responsibility and respective capabilities (CBDR)—has been fatally twisted. Now it says CBDR will be “in light of different national circumstances”. Effectively, this means the US can say it cannot do more because its Congress will not pass legislation. It has legalised lack of ambition or inequity of action. The rest can follow this course as well.

We can call this a “win” for developing countries or for our heating Planet, only if we are delusional.

- Follow Sunita Narain on Twitter at: @sunitanar

- To post your comments on this editorial online, please visit:http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/india-s-climate-strategy-needs-revision

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