INDIA CLIMATE WATCH – JULY 2010 (ISSUE 16)

 

Inside this issue
From the editors desk
India pushes technology transfer
Energy Efficiency Mission gets a boost
World’s First Clean Energy Ministerial
Climate Science
Other Developments
If you thought Indian cities and states were sitting pretty…
Events round up for July 2010

Editor:
Malini Mehra

Research & Reporting
Kaavya Nag, Somya Bhatt, Malini Mehra

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From the Editor’s Desk

Late this month, the UK’s new prime minister, David Cameron, led the largest delegation of ministers and business heavyweights on an official visit to India. Economic concerns were front and centre and Cameron’s objective was to win trade and investment for British business. Climate change too was high on the agenda and the visit saw the first Indian meet of the UK India Business Leaders Climate Group with high-level participation.

Initiated by The Climate Group in February 2010 in London, the Group seeks to advance opportunities for bilateral cooperation on low-carbon economic development and green job creation. It has assembled an A-list set of companies on the UK side – Marks & Spencers, Rolls Royce, HSBC, Johnson & Matthey, News Corporation, etc. The Indian line-up includes renewable energy pioneers such as Suzlon and telecoms leaders such as Bharti Enterprises but is lacklustre compared to the UK assemblage. The Indian side is largely a FICCI-led affair, with FICCI Secretary General, Amit Mitra, as co-chair of the UK India Group with M&S’s Sir Stuart Rose as his British counterpart.

This is the same Dr Mitra who has acquired something of a reputation as an arch climate sceptic for his association with local climate deniars such as the Liberty Institute, and his infamous letter to Dr Manmohan Singh prior to Copenhagen suggesting dire consequences for Indian industry if India were to take on emissions cuts.

Perhaps Dr Mitra experienced a Road to Damascus conversion on climate issues on his road to Copenhagen last December. At any rate, the UK India Business Leaders Climate Group will be one to watch in the coming months. Another forum for meaningless grandstanding or a real platform for low-carbon transformation? Let’s watch and see …

India pushes technology transfer

India will try to push for a common agreement on clean technology sharing under the UN climate change negotiations at a two-day ministerial in November this year. The talks are said to be aimed at clarifying rules on future innovation sharing and existing issues over current technology intellectual property rights (IPR).

A senior government official said “we want a common position on technology transfer through partnerships in which poor countries are given access to technology and that they can get help with applying it as well.”

Energy Efficiency Mission gets a boost

The Perform, Achieve and Trade scheme (PAT) of the National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency – intended to work like a carbon trading scheme between carbon-intensive Indian industries – will take off in April 2011 and run through March 2014.

The announcement was made by Ajay Mathur, head of the Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE). It is also understood that the Energy Conservation Act (2001) has been amended in order to provide a legal mandate for the PAT scheme. The amendment has already been tabled in the Lok Sabha (Lower House) and will go through the Rajya Sabha (Upper House) of Parliament in the next session.

Mathur was delivering an inaugural address at the Confederation of Indian Industries’ (CII) workshop on PAT. He said that prior to the scheme itself, methodologies to specify energy consumption, institutional arrangements for certificates and the like, and general systems and processes would have to be put in place. Bangalore-based C-STEP (Centre for Study of Science, Technology and Policy), will work on the methodology aspects, while a baseline study is to be completed by October 2010.

World’s First Clean Energy Ministerial

On July 19th and 20th, ministers of 24 countries gathered in Washington DC for the world’s first-ever Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM). This meeting brought together countries responsible for 80 percent of the world’s emissions, in order to accelerate the global transition to a low-carbon future. India was represented by the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, Montek Singh Ahluwalia.

While one of the key issues remains finding funds to finance these operations, eleven initiatives were launched at the ministerial. Italy made the first contribution of USD 10 million to the International Finance Corporation (IFC) as part of this process.

These initiatives are intended to avoid needing to build 500 mid-sized thermal power plants over the next 20 years, promote the rapid development of electric vehicles and allied technologies, and bring off-grid electricity to more than 10 million people by 2015.

Director of the Department of Environment, United States, Steven Chu, said “The Clean Energy Ministerial has brought together leaders from around the world to take unprecedented actions to deploy clean energy technologies – from energy efficiency to renewable energy to smart grids to carbon capture”.

Here’s how the leaders intend to do it:

As part of a ‘Global Energy Efficiency Challenge’, governments launched five initiatives. India is part of all but one of these:

1. Super-efficient equipment and appliance deployment initiative – a government-led market transformation initiative. High-priority appliances include televisions and lighting, which account for 15 percent of home electricity usage. The project is likely to be funded through GEF (Global Environmen Facility) funds. India will collaborate with Sweden on developing standardised testing methods for LED lighting in India.

2. Buildings and Industry – the Global Superior Energy Performance (GSEP) partnership will help large buildings and industrial facilities, which account for 60 percent of global energy use, to measure and reduce their energy consumption over time.

3. Smart Grids – International Smart Grid Action Network (ISGAN) – an ‘association of associations’, ISGAN will help accelerate development and deployment of smart electricity grids the world over through high-level government-dialogue and best-practice sharing.

4. Electric Vehicles – the Electric Vehicles Initiative will help countries deliver on electric vehicle targets throught sister-city partnerships. This initiative is expected to help deploy at least 20 million electric vehicles by 2020. India is not a part of this initiative.

5. Capacity-Building for developing country policymakers – through Clean Energy Solution Centres and a network that will facilitate best-practice sharing on emerging policy trends. The initial focus will be on energy efficiency.

Other initiatives are in clean energy supply (carbon capture and storage, wind and solar, bioenergy, and hydropower), and clean energy access (off-grid appliances and women in energy).

Climate Science

Dr. S. Ayyapan, head of the Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR), at a convocation address said 2009 was a drought year, and owing to a 27 percent deficiency in rainfall, resulted in a shortfall of 15 million tonnes of rice alone.

In related news, a recent UNDP report has warned that nearly 15% of the Sunderbans Delta – home to the world’s largest mangrove forests – could be submerged due to sea-level rise and climate change by 2020.

The report of a district-wide human development survey, indicates that over-reliance on natural resources by the inhabitants of the 54 of 102 islands could harm an already fragile ecosystem.

Other Developments

Solar plane completes historic 24 hour run

Solar Impulse – the world’s first solar powered plane to complete a 24-hour flight, marked the longest and highest flight in the history of solar aviation. Piloted by the man widely known for going round the world in a hot air balloon, Swiss national Bertrand Piccard said the success of the flight showed that “we can be much more independent from fossil energy than people usually think.”

The carbon-fiber solar glider plane has 12,000 solar cells built into its 64.3 metre wings, and can reach a maximum speed of 68 knots, and a maximum altitude of 8,564 metres above sea level.

Tata Nano Wind

Tata Power is all set to grab the personal (mini) wind turbine space with a ‘nano’ version of a wind turbine. A 2 KW wind turbine which can be mounted on rooftops, will be tested for its potential to generate enough electricity.

The test turbines are good enough to power multiple fans (60 W), bulbs/lights (40W) and additional appliances if excess battery support is added.

Now a ‘Puneri’ CleanTech for startups

Pune-based startups in the cleantech field have reason for cheer, with an exclusive venture capital fund, awareness and networking platform being formed. Started by Pune-based Harshad Nanal and Anil Pranjpe, in association with New Ventures India (NVI), the forum intends to bring like-minded people together to provide startups in and around Pune with the necessary support.

The network brings together technology professionals, entrepreneurs, students, policy makers, investors, and citizens interested in Energy Efficiency, Renewable Energy, Waste management, Water Management, and Environmentally-Friendly Design/Development/Delivery Alternatives to Traditional Products and Services.

Paranjpe lists the off-beat projects they have come across so far, including a solar-power milk chiller, a hybrid small wind turbine that can take care of small family’s electricity needs, and an efficient system to manage effluent treatment.

Elite runners gather for Himalayan climate action

CSM and India’s foremost Ultrarunner, Dr Rajat Chauhan, joined forces in July to bring attention to the impact of climate change on the Himalayas through a feat of human endurance.

An international team of elite runners assembled for a 139-mile (222km) run over Himalayan peaks to raise attention to climate change. Called ‘The High’ this was certainly the highest and possibly the toughest Ultramarathon in the world.

The route took the runners from Khardung Village along the Leh-Manali Highway to Morey Plains in Jammu & Kashmir. The run was non-stop and completed within a superhuman 72 hours from Saturday 24th to Monday 26th July.

Runners climbed peaks such as Khardung La 5395 m (17,700 ft) and Tanglang La 5359 m (17,582 ft) with a cumulative vertical ascent of 3,107 m and a cumulative vertical descent of 2,704 m.

“With 70 percent of the route above 14,000 feet (4267 m), seven to ten days of acclimatization is compulsory,” says race organizer, Dr Rajat Chauhan, “Not only for the participants but for the 17 volunteers who will assist them.”

American Ultrarunner Bill Andrews, who has run more than 100 Ultramarathons, says, “We are simply demonstrating that it’s possible to expand the envelope of what people perceive are limits of human endurance and capability.”

The brainchild of Dr Rajat Chauhan, a sports medicine and rehabilitation physician from New Delhi, the run is about human endurance and a chance to highlight the threat to ecosystems and livelihoods by climate change in this mountainous region.

The Himalayas are often called the ‘Third Pole’ because they contain the largest store of fresh-water in the world after the North and South poles. The Hindu-Kush Himalaya region is home to ten major river basins and provides water for one fifth of the world’s population.

But the life-giving glaciers – the water towers of Asia – are melting. Scientists estimate that these peaks are melting at twice the rate of surface temperature and we are therefore witnessing the impact of climate change on high-altitude glaciers earlier than the plains.

CSM is profiling the run on its India Climate Portal and building a network of organisations active on climate issues in the Himalayan region.

CSM’s chief executive, Malini Mehra, a runner who completed the London Marathon this year, said: “The controversy over Glaciergate has detracted attention from the urgent need to address the threat to the Himalayas from global warming and black carbon. We need to be doing more and challenge political complacency. Sport is a great way to highlight the issues and we are committed to making ‘The High’ a regular fixture on the Ultra calendar.”

If you thought Indian cities and states were sitting pretty…

Solar Cities: Chandigargh and Kohima

Chandigarh’s master plan to become a solar city has been approved by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE). The city administration has submitted a detailed plan to reduce the city’s energy consumption by 10% in 2012 and by 20% in 2018.. The solar cities plan is one of the components of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission, aiming to have sixty cities designated as such.

The plan has been prepared under the consultation The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), and recommends energy efficiency measures for both residential and commercial areas. Solar power plants of 1 to 5 MW are to be installed in several parts of the city, and consumers will be encouraged to generate electricity, supplying the surplus to the grid. Consumers can avail of a rebate on their bills based on the energy they supply.

Nagaland’s capital, Kohima, one of the first Indian cities to get Solar City status, is expected to reduce its power consumption by 10% over the next ten years.

New Delhi: Government buildings to go green

The New Delhi government will soon issue a proposal to make all its government buildings green buildings by implementing energy efficient measures. All buildings are also expected to become Energy Conservation Building Code (ECBC) compliant. The ECBC will also be implemented in all upcoming buildings of the city and is expected to reduce energy consumption by 25 to 40%.

This proposal forms one part of the government’s climate change plan.

Each district in Maharashtra will have a green plan

In a first-of-its kind step, the Maharashtra government has decided to conduct a detailed assessment of climate change in the state, and its effect on various sectors like fisheries, agriculture, rainfall. The study will be conducted by The Energy Resources Institute (TERI), and the outcome is an action plan for the state, with implementation at every level in all 35 districts of the state.

The implementation of the action plan will be monitored by a special committee headed by the chief secretary and it will also seek assistance from the National Environment Protection Authority (NEPA) which is expected to be set up soon, and the National Green Tribunal.

Tamil Nadu for renewable energy park

The Periyar Science and Technology Centre (PSTC) is all ready to inaugurate a renewable energy park in association with Tamil Nadu Energy Development Agency (TEDA), at the cost of Rs. 1.2 crore.

The park will have models and devices that use non-conventional energy sources, including various types of solar thermal systems (cookers and water heating), solar desalination plants, solar air heating systems, photovoltaics, tidal power generation unit, water power generator, ocean thermal energy conversion system, geothermal energy and fuel cell working models.

Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh release draft solar policies

Both Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh have released draft solar policy plans this month, and say theye aim to go solar in a big way.

Rajasthan has the maximum solar radiation intensity in India and the least rainfall, thus making it best suited for solar power generation. The Rajasthan Energy Department released the draft solar policy for the state in July. The objective is increase Rajasthan’s solar power capacity to 10,000 – 12,000 MW. This will help achieve long-term energy security for Rajasthan and neighbouring states, and ensure ecological security through a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.

The government will create a large R&D hub for the deployment of various combinations of solar technologies and solar based hybrid co-generation technologies, and encourage solar power developers to establish manufacturing plants.

Madhya Pradesh is currently heavily dependent on conventional sources of energy to meet its energy needs. A draft solar policy ocument aims to accelerate the development of solar energy in the state. The initial target is a total capacity of 500 MW, not quite as ambitous as Rajasthan, but one that hopes to provide a clean and reliable source of energy even in the remotest rural areas of the state.

EVENTS ROUNDUP FOR JULY 2010

1. 11 June – 12th July, Public Consultation meetings on Green India Mission in June-July 2010: MoEF organised a series of public consolation meetings on Green India Mission with the help from Centre for Environment Education (CEE), starting from 11 June 2010 in Guwahati. The second public consultation was held at Vishakhapatnam on 16 June. Subsequent consultations were held at Pune, Dehradun, Bhopal, Jaipur and Mysore to finalise mission. The meetings were organised after the draft version of the mission was released earlier in May 2010.

2. 1-2 July 2010, FICCI Environment Conclave (FEC), New Delhi: Organised by FICCI the conclave offered a platform for facilitating policy dialogue, business linkages, technology tie-ups and public private partnerships in sustainable waste management. The main focus of the conclave was industrial and municipal waste management with different thematic areas.

3. 13-14 July 2010, Environment and Climate Change Conference for Asian Students and Teachers, Chennai: Organised by EC3o Asia the conference was an avenue for students and teachers alike to interact with and learn from global experts including environmentalists, fisheries scientists, social scientists, biologists and climate change scientists.

4. 14-15 July 2010, Green Power 2010 : International Conference & Exposition on Renewable Energy Technologies, Chennai: Organised by CII with the aim of bringing together leaders in the fields of technology, policy, industry, and finance to create a profitable platform for High level Networking and Business development in the renewable energy sector. This conference was widely attended by national and international experts, manufacturers, investors and financial institutions.

5. 23-29 July 2010, Climate Change workshops in Kolkata: CSM conducted a series of interactive climate change workshops in eight different schools for students in Kolkata.

6. 24-26 July 2010, The High: The world’s toughest and highest ‘ultramarathon’ run in the Himalayas to bring attention to climate change. (See CSM story above for details.)

7. 29-31 July 2010, International Conference on Environmental Pollution, Water Conservation and Health, Bengaluru: The international conference on environmental pollution, water conservation and health (ICEPWCH-2010) brought together students, engineers, scientists and other professionals from different countries, involved in various aspects of environmental science to exchange and share their experience, new ideas, research results and latest developments in all aspects related to environmental pollution, water conservation and its impact on ecology and human health.

8. 30 July 2010, E-waste Management and handling for Sustainable Cities, Gujarat: Organised by Society for Environment Protection the E-waste conference scheduled as a part of Waste to Resource day celebration; focused on various aspects of E-waste, its global and Indian scenario, the darker side and grey areas of E-waste management and handling, existing legislative framework its pros and cons, Gujarat perspective on E-waste and also technicality of E-waste management, handling and recycling.

9. 30 July 2010, Seminar on “Climate Change & Conservation – Global Issues & Local Concerns, Kolkata: an initiative by EMPATHY the seminar had expert speakers from different fields of climate change and environment protection. The focus areas were Climate Change and Sustainable Development, How we individually are responsible: Our Carbon Footprints and Tiger – The Beauty and The Crisis. This was followed by an interactive session between the attendees.

10. 31 July 2010, Green Buildings: A step towards sustainable future, Gujarat: Organised by Society for eco protection This uniquely designed conference was packed with various prominent speakers like Ar. Jatindra Mistry, Prof. Himanshu Parikh, Ar. Nimish Patel and many such prominent professionals; who shared their experiences on Green Building and Green building rating system.

INDIA CLIMATE WATCH – APRIL 2010 (Issue13)

Inside this issue
Editorial: Meetings like this?
SAARC summit: promise of possibility?
Industries get a PAT this year
New EU Climate Commissioner visits Maldives and India 
Old wine in new bottle: BASIC meet and declare
Uttarakhand Government’s meet on environment
Climate events round-up

Editor:
Malini Mehra

Research & Reporting
Kaavya Nag, Somya Bhatt, Pranav Sinha, Malini Mehra

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April was a month of high-profile climate meetings. While neighbourhood diplomacy stepped up a gear with the SAARC Summit, the newly-emerging markets powerbloc, BASIC, met in Cape Town to strategize on climate positions. A continent away in Europe, UN member states came together for the first time since the fiasco of Copenhagen to declaim on climate and prepare for the 16th Conference of Parties (COP16) meeting under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Mexico later this year. The short weekend meeting – held from Friday 9th April –  Sunday 11 April, brought the two Working Groups on Further Commitments for Annex I Parties under the Kyoto Protocol (AWG-KP 11) and Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention (AWG-LCA 9), together for the next round of negotiations following on from Copenhagen.

The mood music was not cheerful. Recriminations were still floating and bruisings from the battle for the Copenhagen Accord still evident. Not the best indication that the world is on course to meet the climate challenge – still in the world of diplomacy, if one meeting fails, there will surely be another one not far off. Not the ideal sense of urgency one would hope for but it does means that the June session of the UNFCCC in Bonn has to raise the game considerably.

SAARC summit: promise of possibility?

Climate Change was the theme of the Sixteenth Meeting of the Heads of State of SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation), which took place in Thimphu, Bhutan, on 28-29 April 2010. Heads of State of the eight countries adopted the ‘Thimphu Statement on Climate Change’, which includes  among other things, establishing an inter-governmental expert group on climate change, and planting ten million trees in the region over the next five years (2010-15).

The statement is fairly detailed in the promises it hopes to keep, including providing capital for low-carbon technologies, a massive regional afforestation and reforestation campaign, future plans to protect archaeological monuments, strengthen understanding of shared oceans, biodiversity, mountain ecosystems, monsoon initiative, and plan for disaster risk reduction.

The summit also called for cooperation among member states on a range of issues including the formation of an expert group, knowledge sharing and capacity building.

The leaders underscored the need to initiate a process to formulate a common SAARC position on climate change for COP16, including issues such as separate financing for adaptation and mitigation, and technology transfer. Divergent economic drivers have so far been some of the biggest barriers to a common SAARC position, with countries such as the Maldives and Bangladesh on the one hand pushing for strong international pledges in the interests of reducing the adverse future effects of climate change, and developing major India, also a part of SAARC, committing only to reducing emissions intensity by 20-25 percent by 2020.

Listed below are the key initiatives and proposals:

·        Establish an Inter-governmental Expert Group on Climate Change to develop clear policy direction and guidance for regional cooperation
·        Commission a study on ‘Climate Risks in the Region’
·        Explore the feasibility of a SAARC mechanism that will provide financial capital for low-carbon technology and renewable energy projects
·        Strengthen the understanding of shared water bodies in the region through an Marine Initiative
·        Inter-governmental Mountain Initiative to study mountain ecosystems and glaciers, and their contribution to livelihoods and sustainable development
·        an Inter-governmental Monsoon Initiative on the evolving pattern of monsoons to assess vulnerability due to climate change
·        SAARC Inter-governmental Climate-related Disasters Initiative on the integration of Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) with Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR)
·        Establish institutional linkages among national institutions in the region to facilitate sharing of knowledge and capacity building programmes in climate change
·        Enhance cooperation in the energy sector to facilitate energy trade, development of efficient conventional and renewable energy sources including 
         hydropower.
·        Action Plan on Energy Conservation would be prepared by the SAARC Energy Centre (SEC), Islamabad and creation of a web portal on Energy Conservation 
         for exchange of information and sharing of best practices among SAARC Member States.

Climate change has become a core issue for SAARC as the entire region is vulnerable to the impacts of environmental degradation and regional collaborative efforts to mitigate the impacts of climate change have gained prominence. However, although climate change has been part of the agenda right from the 5th SAARC Summit in 1990, even a 2007 ministerial meet in Dhaka and the ‘SAARC Action Plan on Climate Change’ yielded no concrete results. Pledges to act on the Action Plan between 2009 and 2012 have not yet been initiated. While leaders have pledged in Thimphu to review its implementation and  establish an expert group under it to develop a clear policy direction it remains to be seen whether actions will follow words.

Neither did SAARC countries defend a common position at Poznan (2008) or Copenhagen (2009) at the UN conferences on climate change.

While this April 2010 Thimphu Summit provided an opportunity to devise a common climate agenda as a regional group, it remains to be seen whether possible areas of cooperation will be implemented or shelved, as is the normal pattern.

Industries get a PAT this year

Indian industry is the primary consumer of electrical energy in India, accounting for 42 percent of the country’s total commercial energy use in 2004-05. With a high growth rate across all industry sectors (small, medium and large enterprises), electricity capacity addition needs to touch 400 GW by 2030 if it is to meet the demands of all consumers (private and commercial) across the country.The Indian government hopes to meet some of this deficit by improving energy efficiency across both electricity providers and consumers through the National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency (NMEEE). This rather than increasing production while doing nothing about inefficiencies in the sector appears to be the way forward.

The NMEEE is expected to account for annual fuel savings in excess of 23 million toe by 2014, achieve a cumulative avoided electricity capacity addition of 19,000 MW, and save 98 million tons CO2 emissions per year.

The “Perform Achieve and Trade” (PAT) scheme is a market-based mechanism under the NMEEE, crucial for achieving these targets. It aims to fix specific energy consumption (SEC) targets for large energy-guzzling installations across India. Nine sectors in which the PAT scheme is to be operationalised have been identified – power stations, cement, steel, fertilisers, aluminium, chlor-alkali, paper, textiles and railways. 714 energy-intensive installations across these sectors have been identified as the initial targets for the PAT scheme.  The scheme is limited to energy efficiency targets, and does not cover other sources of carbon emissions.

Under the PAT scheme, the Bureau of Energy Efficiency (the implementer of the NMEEE) will issue Energy Savings Certificates (ESCerts) to the identified (714) installations (factories or power production facilities), against targets that the BEE will set for them. Installations will have to meet their targets, and those having excess ESCerts can sell credits to those who fall short – much like the Kyoto protocol’s carbon credit mechanism.

Speaking at the 2nd Indo German Energy Symposium, BEE Director General, Ajay Mathur said ‘a wide bandwidth of energy efficiencies occurs in almost all industry sectors which creates a differentiated potential for energy savings. Designing benchmarks and standards are challenging tasks for us’. What he means to say, for those of us unfamiliar with energy terms, is that owing to several standards and benchmarks, BEE is not going to insist on one single benchmark across all industries. Instead, Industry will be allowed to gradually become more energy-efficient from their present levels.

A time frame of three years, beginning April 2011, has been set out by BEE for driving energy-intensive manufacturing companies to adhere to energy conservation norms, and for ESCerts to become a reality.

New EU Climate Commissioner Visits Maldives and India  

The European Union’s new Commissioner for Climate Action, Connie Hedegaard, visited Maldives on 6 April and India on 7-9 April to convey a fresh EU negotiating strategy on climate talks post Copenhagen. The Maldives and India were among the countries which negotiated the Copenhagen Accord, the principal outcome of the Copenhagen conference, and both have pledged emission reduction actions under it.  

This visit was part of the EU outreach programme to pick up the threads from the December 2009 UN climate conference in Copenhagen and discuss how to take international negotiations forward.

As part of her visit to India, Commissioner Hedegaard met environment Minister Jairam Ramesh and the Minister of Coal & Mines, Prakash Jaiswal. She also met with a small group of representatives from industry, NGOs, think tanks, and the World Bank to discuss adaptation and mitigation of climate change including options for low carbon strategies and measures in India.

She commented that India and China cannot be looked at as a single unit, since challenges are different for both countries. Also, that the United States and China need to be moved on climate action. She hoped that India through BASIC as well as other forums could influence China. Hedegaard was against using climate and environment opportunities to create new trade wars, but rather to channel the opportunities through an international framework for a carbon trading system.

As far as the international climate negotiations, the EU wants to get agreement on key elements in Cancun, where the COP16 talks are scheduled in 2010 December, and knock in some progress on contentious issues such as legal form for discussion between Cancun and South Africa (2011).

Also, 24-member European parliamentary delegation, led by Chairman Graham Watson visited India between 26-29th April 2010 to seek fruitful dialogue with India on security, terrorism and climate change, apart from greater cooperation in energy security, cultural and people to people exchange.

Old wine new bottle: BASIC meet and declare

Environment Ministers from the BASIC (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) block of countries met in Cape Town in late April, in what is now the second time since Copenhagen that the group has met.

The group issued a joint statement in which it called for renewed focus on maintaining the existing framework of the international negotiations – the two-track approach of the Kyoto Protocol for short-term industrialised country emission reduction targets, and the Long-term Cooperative Action (LCA) for action under the Convention. Ministers maintained that political agreements on contentious issues must be ‘translated’ into the official negotiating texts, but that the UNFCCC is the only legitimate forum for climate change negotiations.

Stating that ‘internationally binding legal agreements already exist’ under the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) and the Kyoto Protocol, Ministers felt that the UNFCCC process must conclude a legally binding outcome by Cancun this year, or at the most, by 2011 when negotiations will be held in South Africa. The Joint Statement also pushed for operationalising the promised fast-track finance of USD 10 billion to developing countries for adaptation and mitigation action.

The previous meeting, held prior to the January 31st deadline for the Copenhagen Accord’s proposed country actions submissions, was held in New Delhi. Here, ministers met to discuss a common strategy and response to the Copenhagen Accord. The group also indicated that they would soon announce a  BASIC-led fund to help other developing countries cope with climate change. However, no details regarding the BASIC fund have emerged from the April 25th Cape Town meeting, although reference to the Delhi meeting was made in the joint statement.

While the Joint Statement elaborated areas under the UNFCCC negotiations that could make progress prior to Cancun, such as fast start finance, implementation of REDD, architecture on technology transfer, adaptation programmes and a MRV work programme; no significant internal (i.e. BASIC-centric) actions were proposed or elaborated from previous meetings.

The BASIC countries decided that moving forward, they would hold another meeting, this time in Brazil, to recast the equity debate

Uttarakhand Government’s meet on Environment

Following in the footsteps of Nepal, which held a cabinet meeting at the Mount Everest base camp to draw the attention of the world community towards receding glaciers, the government of Uttarakhand held a 12-member cabinet meeting on the banks of River Ganga at Haridwar. The main objective of this meeting was to highlight the environmental concerns of the state with a major focus on the River Ganga and the receding Gangotri glacier.

The meeting led to the decision to set up a Ganga Conservation Board  – an autonomous body which will work towards the restoration of the river and the Gangotri glacier. The government has also billed a plan called the ‘Ganga Nirmal Yojna’ which will work on the cleaning the river. A six point resolution was passed in order to achieve the mammoth task of cleaning the river.

EVENTS ROUNDUP FOR THE MONTH OF APRIL 2010

1.      1, 2 and 3 April 2010, The Al Gore Sustainable technology venture competition, Chennai: Hosted by IIT Madras, it is Asia’s first and most prestigious sustainable/clean technology business plan competition, founded in 2007

2.      7 April 2010, National Workshop on Climate Smart Disaster Risk Management, New Delhi: Organised by SEED and Christian Aid with support from DFID, this conference focused around filling the gaps between climate change adaptation, social protection and disaster risk reduction.

3.      12 and 13 April 2010, Algae Bio-fuel Workshop, New Delhi: Organised by the Grow Diesel Climate Care Council the main focus of the workshop was the next generation bio fuel using algae as a main feedstock. The workshop brought together investors, entrepreneurs, Bio fuel companies, renewable fuel experts, their associates and academia to share their valuable experiences and knowledge.

4.      13 April 2010, Climate leader initiative on ‘Climate Change and Conservation’, Kolkata: Organised by EMPATHY this seminar focused on the key issues related to Environment and conservation and saw participation from different stakeholders.

5.      23 and 24 April 2010, National Conference on Ensuring Food Security in a Changing Climate, New Delhi: This conference was jointly organised by Gene Campaign and Action Aid India the conference was attended by participants from twenty two states. A range of speakers representing the scientific community, the government, academics, international organizations and civil society groups working on agriculture and environment spoke about the various issues involved in ensuring food security in a changing climate.

6.      27 April 2010, Water Conclave, New Delhi: Organised by CII with proper management of available water resources being the main theme this conclave saw the participation from a number of investors, entrepreneurs, academia, scientists, water resources experts and other stakeholders.

7.      28 and 29 April 2010, 2nd Indo-German Energy Symposium, New Delhi: Organised by the Indo-German Energy forum this symposium had two main focus areas being decentralized renewable energies and demand side energy efficiency.   Meeting the objective of decoupling development from energy consumption and related CO2 emissions, India submitted within the National Action Plan on Climate Change the National Solar Mission and the National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency. The agenda of the Symposium was to strengthen the bilateral dialogue focussing on these initiatives

 

INDIA CLIMATE WATCH – MARCH 2010 (Issue12) 

INSIDE THIS ISSUE

Comment: Earth Hour 2010
India accepts CA with reservations – special focus on Chindia and UNFCCC
Shyam Saran demits office; India on lookout for key negotiators after Ghosh & Dasgupta quit
MoEF splits into Forests & Wildlife
Chindia co-operation for environment
Chindia MOU & bilaterals – analysis
Global Warming casts its shadow upon Kerala
Climate events round-up for March 2010

Editor:
Malini Mehra

Research & Reporting
Kaavya Nag, Somya Bhatt, Pranav Sinha, Malini Mehra

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Highlights

MoEF to spilt traditionally clubbed wildlife and forestry divisions into two. Process officially approved by PM

India accepts CA with reservations – special focus on Chindia and UNFCCC

After months of dilly-dallying on whether or not to put its name into the Copenhagen Accord, India finally allowed for a conditional association. In full coordination, and just a day after, China too asked for its name to be put under the accord conditionally.

While both countries were key players in drafting the Accord while in Copenhagen, they soon distanced themselves from it, maintaining that the Accord was undoubtedly a political exercise.

In his letter to the then Executive Secretary Yvo de Boer on March 8th, key Indian negotiator R.R. Rashmi made clear three points;

1)      The Accord is a political document and is not legally binding.
2)      The Accord is not a separate and third track of negotiations outside of the UNFCCC
3)      The purpose of the Accord is to bring about greater consensus on the existing two-track UNFCCC process, and to ‘facilitate the ongoing two-track negotiations under the UNFCCC…’.

Rashmi further indicated that India would be willing to be listed in the chapeau of the Copenhagen Accord, given the understanding that neither the Accord nor portions of it would become a new track under the UNFCCC negotiations. And neither would it be included in any part of the negotiating text.

Just a day later, Minister for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh address Parliament, explaining why India has acceded to the Accord. He indicated that the government believed, that acceding to the Accord would ‘strengthen our negotiating position on climate change’.

Similarly, Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao said ‘it is neither viable nor acceptable to start a new negotiation process outside the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol’. But China too, on 9th March, agreed to have its name included in the Accord, with the Director General of China’s department of climate change Si Wei confirming that the UNFCCC could include its name in the Accord.

A Ministry of Defense annual report clearly highlights tensions on China’s modernization of military forces along the northern borders. Nevertheless, India and China have rapidly moved towards convergence on climate-related issues. With both countries pursuing high-growth development pathways and refusing to accept any legally binding emissions under the UNFCCC, their climate-relationship continues to be cemented.

Chinese Vice Premier Hui Liangyu reportedly told Minister for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh, that China regards cooperation in the field of climate change as the most successful example of bilateral cooperation with India.

This has been evident ever since the two countries signed an agreement to address climate change, and teamed up along with two other developing giants to form the BASIC group.

Bilateral cooperation has charged ahead with the two countries meeting in end March to chart out their future course of action. This round of talks will be followed up with two more rounds in April and May.

Shyam Saran demits office, India looks for new negotiators

As reported earlier, Shyam Saran – the Prime Minister’s special envoy on climate change – demitted office on 14th March 2010. Mr. Saran resigned from the post on February 19 reportedly after having differences with Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh over India’s climate policy.

India had shifted its stance on climate change policy—from one that out and out refused to take on any binding emission reduction targets to a more accepting stance of taking on voluntary cuts in emissions intensity. All this, within a calendar year. The move effectively shocked old guard bureaucrats and policy-makers, who had, up until then, been the sole drivers of India’s climate policy.

With this, speculation over the reconstitution of the Prime Minister’s Panel on Climate Change has also become stronger. Union minister (of state) for Environment and Forests, Jairam Ramesh, has reportedly dropped Prodipto Ghosh and Chandrashekhar Dasgupta — his most vocal critics — from the suggestive list of members on the negotiating team, which he forwarded to the PM. The two veteran ex-bureaucrats along with Saran, often held dramatically different views than Ramesh on what India’s negotiating position should be at the international climate talks.

This move, as well as statements to the press by Ramesh, have sent out clear signals that Ramesh believes bureaucrats must not be able to sway national policy based on their beliefs. In effect, only those officials who are willing to follow a more flexible approach at the negotiations are welcome to remain.

It is expected that a new negotiating team will be in place for the next round of climate talks which begin in Bonn on April 9th. The MoEF had approached Ajay Mathur, the director general (DG) of Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) to represent India in Germany. However, Mathur was not keen on donning the role of a chief negotiator, considering his work at BEE was likely to suffer. The new list of negotiators is expected to be short listed by none other than Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

The government also plans to create an inter-ministerial body coordinated by the climate change division at the department of science and technology to resolve contentious scientific issues on the impact of global warming on India. This body will complement the efforts of the environment ministry, but concentrate on sorting out differences of opinion between experts on the actual impact of climate change on India’s monsoon, forests and farming systems and see that whatever input we present internationally will be unanimous.

India-China team up on environment

The two major developing giants India and China, particularly given their rapid and escalating rates of growth, are likely to be two of the largest resource users in the years to come. Given this, ambitious scientific and economic cooperation between the two is essential in order to combat the effects such development will have on climate change and biodiversity loss.

While possibly not for such egalitarian reasons, India and China’s growing environment-related cooperation is a step in the right direction. The growing bonds of environment and climate cooperation are a stark contrast to the bitter military disputes in the past. But after forming the group of BASIC countries, the first bilateral relations on environment which began on 26th March, are further cementing Chindia’s green relations.

Chinese Vice Premier Hui Liangyu met with Minister for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh to discuss cooperation in forestry and wildlife, application of biotechnology in agriculture, environment management and climate change. Ramesh indicated that forestry and agriculture dominated the discussions.

China’s plans of increasing artificial forest cover by 4 million hectares each year seem to have inspired India, which is ten times as slow, at 4 million hectares in ten years. China currently has the maximum area under artificial forest cover for any country – over 53 million hectares – according to statistics released by the State Forestry Administration (China). Plans are to increase area under forest cover from 18.21 percent in 2008 to 26 percent by 2050, and plant 40 million hectares of forest over the next ten years.

India’s own aspirational target is 30 percent forest cover. Currently and according to government figures, ‘tree cover’ in India is pegged at 20 percent, and after the talks, seems to have gained some inspiration from this high level of Chinese ambition.

A high level team is scheduled to visit China in April to discuss possibilities for forestry research, surveys and management.

While BT crops and their related issues were discussed, wildlife protection was also an area that was touched upon.

Eight researchers from across the world have incidentally published an appeal for greater scientific cooperation between India and China in the journal Science. The report comes close on the heels of this bilateral between the developing majors. The report calls for ‘more earnest cooperation between the world’s two most populous countries’.

ChIndia MOU & bilaterals – analysis

China India’s ‘Bhai-Bhai’ cooperation on Climate Change reached the next level in late October last year, when the two sides signed a five-year agreement to jointly fight climate change and negotiate international climate deals. The partnership is also expected to strengthen their bilateral dialogue. The agreement, which came ahead of United Nations climate-change summit held in Copenhagen in December 2009, was signed by the Minister of State for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh and China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) Vice-Chairman Xie Zhenhua. China’s NDRC and India’s Ministry of Environment and Forests will be designated authority for implementation of this agreement. The cooperation is also important in terms of negotiations as there is virtually no difference between Indian and Chinese negotiating positions on international climate treaties, said Ramesh in a statement.

Highlights of the Memorandum of Agreement (MoA)

·         Hold ministerial consultations to deepen mutual understanding, strengthen coordination and enhance cooperation, and conduct regular exchange of views
·         Establish an India- China Working Group on Climate Change. The Working Group will hold annual meetings alternately in China and India to discuss respective domestic policies and measures and implementation of related cooperative projects.
·         Agree to strengthen their exchange of views and cooperation on mitigation policies, programmes, projects, technology development and demonstration relating to greenhouse gas emission reduction on following: (a) Energy conservation and energy efficiency (b) Renewable energies (c) Clean coal (d) Methane recovery and utilization (e) Afforestation and sustainable management of forests and ecosystems (f) Transportation (g) Sustainable habitat.
·         To enhance cooperation in the area of adaptation recognize the equal priority of adaptation and mitigation in tackling climate change

Experts from both sides who participated in a workshop, shared their respective national action plans to tackle climate change including domestic initiatives, issues in multilateral negotiations (mitigation, adaptation, technology transfer and finance) and outlook for the Copenhagen conference in December 2009.

In order to take forward the bilateral cooperation in tackling issues of climate change, India and China held talks on 26th March 2010 to chart out future course of action. During the visit, Vice Premier of China Mr Hui Liangyu regarded Climate Change as the most successful example of bilateral cooperation. He said,” We will be exchanging ideas on what more we need to do.” As part of the cooperation, Ramesh will be visiting China April 10-11 and May 7-9 to attend meetings related to climate change. Recently, Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh also announced an agreement with China for glaciological studies would be finalised soon as shrinking glaciers is a big area of cooperation.

Global Warming casts shadow on Kerala

Kerala- ‘God’s Own Country’ has been witness to the effects of global warming in past, in the form of changes in rainfall pattern, depleting groundwater and rise in mean annual temperatures among others. With its 550km of coastline, Kerlala has already been predicted in IPCC reports to be one of the worst affected  from increasing sea levels and drying up of fresh water resources.  By mid-March this year, temperature across the state rose to unprecedented levels, leading to more than 20 cases of severe sun burns . The highest temperature recorded was 42 degree centigrade from the Palakkad district , and at a time of year when temperatures never rose to more than 37 degree C in the past, leading to a state of panic amongst the locals as well as the state officials.

A disaster management team was sent by the state government soon after the cases were reported . Later in the month, members of the state assembly agreed  on setting up a task force with short and long term goals to combat the effects of climate change. Finance and revenue minister KP Rajendran announced a fund of Rs 15 crore for relief activities and fight against the looming danger of drought. Chief Minister V.S Achuthanandan has commissioned the Centre for Earth Science Studies (CESS) at Thiruvananthapuram to carry out a detailed research of climate related variations in the state and submit a report that will help formulate effective adaptation and mitigation strategies for the state.

EVENTS ROUND UP FOR THE MONTH OF MARCH 2010

1.      2, 3 and 4 March, 2010, Methane to Markets Partnership Expo, New Delhi: Organised by US EPA, Govt of India and Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce (FICCI) this expo was attended by people from diverse backgrounds ranging from project developers and financers, policy makers, manufacturers and vendors and industry representatives. The programme included discussions on key methane capture technologies and policy, methane marketplace and government and industry partnerships.

2.      4 and 5 March, 2010, Conference on Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission-The Way Ahead at World Trade Centre, Mumbai: In view of the importance of announcement of the National Solar Mission by GoI Solar Energy Society of India and Electronics today jointly organised this two conference which witnessed global participation and many key issues related to solar power production, policy, technology and implementation were discussed.

3.      5 and 6 March, 2010, Climate Change and CDM opportunities, Hyderabad: This Workshop on climate change and clean development mechanism opportunities in industries, urban infrastructure, buildings, railways, municipalities, agriculture was organised by CCCEA and Siri Energy with the aim of familiarising the participants with the key issues and opportunities in CDM post Copenhagen.

4.      18 March, 2010, World Renewable Energy Technology Congress and Expo 2010, New Delhi: With the central theme of Global Technology Cooperation for Renewable Energy the expo aimed to supplement the efforts of the government by providing a platform to showcase opportunities in the Indian market for global players.

5.      24 March, 2010, Youth Interaction at the British Deputy High Commission, Kolkata: This interactive meet was attended by Young journos, NGO representatives, students of the JU Global Change Program, and Environment Science

6.      25 March, 2010, CII meet on Climate Change, Kolkata: CII, Eastern Region, organised a panel discussion on how to strengthen NGO business partnership to cope with the challenges being thrown up by climate change, according to a CII-ER release. The keynote address was given by Mr Fergus Auld, First Secretary, Climate Change & Energy, British High Commission. Among other speakers were Mr Debal Roy, Chief Environment Officer, Government of West Bengal; Ms Malini Mehra, CEO, Central For Social Markets; Mr Subhas Dutta, green activist; Mr Ram Agarwal, Chairman, West Bengal State Council and Director S R Batliboi & Company; and Mr Sanjay Wadhvani, Deputy High Commissioner, British Deputy High Commission in Kolkata.

7.      29 March, 2010, National Seminar for post-Copenhagen: Immediate task for India, Hyderabad: This was a Seminar for media personnel at the Engineering Staff College of India, Hyderabad.  Organised with the aim of providing an opportunity to the participants to further strengthen their knowledge base on this most important topic of current times to help them educate and inform the public effectively.

INDIA CLIMATE WATCH – FEBRUARY 2010 (Issue11)

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INSIDE THIS ISSUE

From the Editor’s desk
Budget 2010- how climate friendly was it?
Shyam Saran resigns as PM’s special envoy
Yvo resigns, India proposes Sharma as UNFCCC chief
India to get panel on climate change
Per capita approach to be revisited?
Climate skeptics get platform in Delhi
Maldives seeks India’s help
Green Commonwealth Games?
Indian states get active on climate change
Delhi Sustainable Development Summit
Indo-UK study looks at water cycle changes
Climate events round-up

Editor:
Malini Mehra

Research & Reporting
Kaavya Nag, Somya Bhatt, Pranav Sinha, Malini Mehra

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From the Editor’s desk

What a month. From high-profile resignations to Union Budget announcements, there has scarcely been a day without climate in the news. While the much-maligned but also fulsomely-supported IPCC chair and TERI supremo, Dr Rajendra Pachauri, has managed to hold onto his post for another month, February saw the announced departure of both Shyam Saran and Yvo de Boer. Neither was a surprise.

In Saran’s case, there has been a war of attrition with the Minister of State for Environment & Forests, Jairam Ramesh, since it became apparent that the Minister had a mind of his own when it came to Indian climate policy and politics. Since he took office in May 2009, the Minister and the Prime Minister’s special envoy have been at loggerheads with the former a reformist and the latter in the traditional mould of a defender of the faith. (The faith being the per-capita based climate orthodoxy followed by Indian governments since year dot.)

Not unsurprisingly, the Minister has had a tough time of it battling the ranked masses of supporters of the orthodoxy in both his Ministry as well as the press. But his sheer bloody-mindedness in getting things done has had an impact. Week on week and month on month, one has seen the needle rise with ever more initiatives on the multi-headed Hydra that is climate change. The Minister has made his ministry rise to the tempo and consolidated his grip on environment and climate policy across the government.

In the battle of wills with Saran, the Minister has won. But in the battle for the heart and soul of India’s climate policy, the Minister is not yet done – he has barely just begun. This is not a short-game. It is a long-game of changing risk-averse and change-averse institutions and demonstrating the economic and political benefit of action on climate change. This requires a powerful new narrative and it is not clear whether the Minister has found his compelling story on this as yet. One that will connect with both the titans of industry and the tillers in the field.

The fact that he is not quite there yet was revealed by yet another Union Budget that failed to make provisions for the much-vaunted eight Missions of the National Action Plan on Climate Change. Two years on and still no clear allocation as to how these expressions of intent are to be funded and implemented. With the riveting exception of the National Solar Mission, the flagship mission of the Government, one is at a loss as to explain how the Government has placed climate change at the heart of its policy-making. It seems very much like an ad-hoc affair still.

At the sub-national level, though, one can see the impact that a little bit of energy on climate change can unleash. State after state – though still not in the double digits – appears to be moving on climate change and expressing a new-found ambition to be ‘carbon neutral’ or the greenest state in the country. Much finer ambitions than merely to have the highest state-level GDP growth rate in the country. Especially if that growth is green and sustainable, not carbon-based and cancerous. If the national politics on growth and climate changes as a result, we could well be in very different territory come the next elections.

Budget 2010- how climate friendly was it?

India’s Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, announced the Union Budget for 2010-2011 in Delhi on 26 February 2010. With global attention on climate change and India having announced its own voluntary commitment to reduce emissions intensity by 20-25 per cent by 2020, the question many were asking was: is the government going to put its money where its mouth is? The Minister’s speech signaled the government’s intention to transform India’s energy mix and meet the twin challenges of energy security and climate change. The Budget 2010 did contain some important announcements and initiatives – perhaps the most significant of which was the National Clean Energy Fund and the energy cess on coal (domestic and imported).

Here’s a look at some of the key measures:

Direct Funding

1. To establish a National Clean Energy Fund for funding research and innovative projects in clean energy technologies and harnessing renewable energy sources to reduce dependence on fossil fuels.
2. A doubling of the budget for the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) – largely to fund the Government’s flagship Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission. (The Solar Mission has an ambitious target of reaching 20,000 MW of solar power by the year 2022, effectively making India a leading player in solar energy in years to come.)  MNRE’s budget rose by 61 percent – from Rs 620 crore in 2009-10 to Rs.1000 crore in 2010-11.
3. An allocation of Rs 200 crore for launching the Climate Resilient Agriculture Initiative. This seeks to sustain gains made in the green revolution but strengthen conservation farming, which involves soil health, water conservation and biodiversity preservation.

Tax Proposals

1. Clean energy cess on coal produced in India at a rate of Rs.50 per tonne. The cess will also apply to imported coal to build the corpus of the National Clean Energy Fund.
2. Concessional customs duty of 5 per cent on machinery, instruments, equipment and appliances etc. required for the initial setting up of photovoltaic and solar thermal power generating units and also exempt from Central Excise duty. Ground source heat pumps used to tap geothermal energy would be exempt from basic customs duty and special additional duty.
3. Exempt a few more specified inputs (some were already exempt in last year’s budget) required for the manufacture of rotor blades for wind energy generators from Central Excise duty.
4. Halve Central Excise duty on LED lights from 8 per cent to 4 per cent. This now places LEDs on par with Compact Fluorescent Lamps (CFLs).
5. Provide concessional excise duty of 4 per cent to CSIR-developed ‘Soleckshaw’ – the solar version of a hand-pulled cycle rickshaw which runs on solar-powered batteries. The Soleckshaw’s key parts and components would also be exempt from customs duty.

National Clean Energy Fund and cess on coal

The National Clean Energy Fund (NCEF), a provisional title for this initiative, and the cess on coal are arguably the most interesting innovations in the budget. The former is intended to provide a source of investment for entrepreneurial ventures and research into clean energy technologies. The bulk of the funds for the NCEF are to be raised through a clean energy cess on coal produced in India as well as imported coal at a rate of Rs 50 per tonne. This cess on coal is not the first such ‘green tax’ to be applied in the India. The water cess has been levied and collected by the State Pollution Control Boards for prevention and control of water pollution for some time.

How large is the fund likely to be? The estimated demand for coal in India in the Budget period is likely to be 440 million tonnes (2010-11) and 518 million tonnes (2011-12) respectively. An extrapolation from this suggests that the size of the NCEF could be anything in the range of INR 22,000 million to INR 25,900 million respectively for FY 2010-11 and 2011-12. This will increase as India’s appetite for coal increases, but the revenues generated could build a core funding base for the Missions under the National Action Plan on Climate Change (NAPCC).

By making the tax environment less friendly for fossil fuel firms and by providing fiscal relief for companies in the renewable energy sector, the government has provided a helping hand. This is to be welcomed but will need to be built on aggressively if the scale of the ‘greening India’ challenge is to be met effectively. For now, though there is at least something for those in the renewable energy industry to capitalise on.

Looking across the Budget, it can be seen that energy security concerns and environment have been further embedded with some fiscal incentives and budgetary support for green measures. An allocation has been made for the Solar Mission but the remaining seven Missions of the NAPCC are still left stranded, and the mitigation and adaptation challenge faced by the country has been inadequately addressed. The Government has not made good on its promises to put budgets next to programmes.

For example, the National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency (NMEEE) was supposed to be one of the two priority Missions in the NAPCC. The NMEEE is supposed to be implemented from April 1 2010. The Government says that it is aiming at building a market worth Rs 74,000 crore for energy efficient products and accrue avoided capacity addition of over 19,000 MW, however, no budget has been announced for this. One can only surmise that as the Ministry of Power will be overseeing the MNEEE, and as the Ministry of Power’s budget allocation has more than doubled from Rs 2,230 crore in 2009-10 to Rs 5,130 crore in 2010- 11, that we will see baseline funds for the MNEEE. But in the absence of clarity from the Government, this remains speculation. 

More worryingly, the status of the six other missions of the NAPCC continues to be in limbo. The table below provides an update of where things are presently at. (Budgetary updates 2010-11 have been indicated in square brackets.)

Status of NAPCC Eight Missions (February 2010)

1. Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission – Approved by Prime Minister’s Council on Climate Change (PMCCC); to be coordinated by M/o New & Renewable Energy. [Funds approved in Budget 2010-11]
2. National Mission for Enhanced Energy Efficiency – Approved by PMCCC and to be implemented from 1 April 2010; to be coordinated by M/o Power.
3. National Mission for Sustaining the Himalayan Ecosystem – Draft dated 26 October 2009 approved by PMCCC in principle.
4. National Mission on Strategic Knowledge on Climate Change – Final draft (15 October 2009) considered by PMCCC but decision unknown.
5. National Mission on Sustainable Habitat – Final Draft Mission document prepared by M/o Urban Development, under consideration by PMCCC.
6. National Water Mission – Mission document prepared by M/o Water Resources, under consideration by PMCCC.
7. National Mission for Green India – Mission document prepared by M/o Environment & Forests, under consideration by PMCCC.
8. National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture – Mission document prepared by M/o Agriculture, under consideration by PMCCC.

Shyam Saran resigns as PM’s special envoy

On 20 February 2010, the Prime Minister’s Office released a simple line, “The Special Envoy to the Prime Minister on Climate Change has been permitted to demit office from Friday, March 14”, indicating that Shyam Saran would no longer continue in post. His sudden resignation from office, at a time when he was due to chair a key strategy meeting for India’s post-Copenhagen plans, clearly indicates changes are afoot in the Government’s climate configurations.

India’s environment minister Jairam Ramesh, the relative newbie to climate change who has barely been in office for nine months, has been pushing the envelope on the way India approaches international climate negotiations. He may well have had the highest level of backing for many of his statements and they now leave little room for doubt that India is serious about carving out a new space in international climate politics. Ramesh’s outspokenness had long raised the hackles of Saran and the old guard who saw the Minister has stepping on their turf and contravening accepted shibboleths of India’s climate change policy, particularly at the UNFCCC.

The differences of opinion between Shyam Saran on the one hand – a retired senior diplomat who drafted the controversial Indo-US nuclear deal – and the Minister of State (without a cabinet seat) for Environment and Forests, Jairam Ramesh, on the other had been evident ever since the Minister took office in May 2009. Differences were first seen when Ramesh expressed his disappointment at Saran’s handling of statements about the Major Economies Forum (MEF) Summit at La Aquila, Italy. In the run-up to Copenhagen, however, Saran and his allies seem to have got their own back when a letter from Ramesh to the Prime Minister was leaked. The letter allegedly asked for a review of India’s position and led to threats of resignation by senior negotiators. These officials effectively held the government to ransom with a no-show on the first day of talks at the Copenhagen climate conference in December. It was only when the Prime Minister intervened and called for Ramesh and Saran to sit together and formulate a ‘joint statement’ on India’s approach for Copenhagen that peace broke out in Team India.

Even after Copenhagen, the differences were evident with Saran reportedly in favour of India rejecting the Copenhagen Accord, while Ramesh was in favour of it. A Member of Parliament even commented that internal politics were harming peoples’ understanding of Indian climate politics, and that a coordinated effort was needed.

While Shyam Saran maintains that his decision to quit was for personal reasons, in a leaked letter to the Prime Minister last year, he clearly indicated his misgivings regarding the Minister’s attempts to change India’s negotiating stance. While Jairam Ramesh initially refused to comment on Saran’s resignation, he later said that bureaucrats cannot dictate policies as they are consultants. He pointedly noted that it is the job of the Ministry to decide policy as the Ministry is accountable to Parliament.

Saran’s resignation comes at a time when Ramesh has commissioned a study on the various approaches that India could take to international burden sharing on climate change other than its long-standing per-capita approach. This also comes at a time when the climate negotiating team is expected to be re-cast as India prepares its climate change strategy, and when budgetary allocations for key programmes such as the Solar Mission are only just being put in place. In sum, it seems that for the present, the Minister of State is firmly in charge.

Yvo resigns, India proposes Sharma as UNFCCC chief
 
In another spectacular resignation, the Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC, Yvo de Boer, announced that he would be stepping down with effect from 1 July 2010. After four years in the post- and momentous ones at that – the former Dutch civil servant said he was leaving to enable the UN Secretary General to appoint a suitable candidate in time for the important COP16 talks in Mexico in November.

Although his term officially ends in September, few doubted that the job had taken its toll on the straight-talking Dutchman whose dry wit and emotional commitment – few would remember his tears of frustration at Bali – had endeared him to many involved in the climate negotiations.

Expecting to steer the world to a successful conclusion at Copenhagen, the eventual collapse of the talks was partly attributable to the failure of de Boer and the Danish Presidency to find a timely and adequate point of political convergence. Although herding cats would have been easier than trying to create consensus from parties with such widely divergent interests.

Yvo himself has characterized Copenhagen as “an absolute disaster” and has now freed himself to speak his mind in a non-political role as advisor to global services firm, KPMG, on climate change. With his departure, the field has now opened up for candidates – in particular from developing countries –to fill the post of UNFCCC head.

India was swift off the block to propose its own candidate, Vijai Sharma, Principal Secretary at the Ministry of Environment & Forests (MoEF). Sharma has been leading the Indian delegation at the climate negotiations and is seen as a competent if dull bureaucrat in the traditional Indian mould.

In proposing his candidacy, Jairam Ramesh, Minister of MoEF, said that Sharma would be a candidate from the BASIC grouping and already enjoyed backing from the Chinese. While India and China enjoy a you-scratch-my-back-I-scratch-yours relationship on climate change, it is not self-evident that Brazil and South Africa will wish to support India’s candidate.

The field is expected to widen and it may well be that a candidate from a less politically spiky country – such as Indonesia’s foreign minister, Hassan Wirajuda – could emerge as a frontrunner; or even one of the many seasoned diplomats from the AOSIS countries who were in evidence in the final chaotic hours of Copenhagen.

One thing is for sure: with so many eyes watching the process and with the UNFCCC’s legitimacy at stake, the result had better not be a stitch-up.

India to get panel on climate change

On 4 February 2010, the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh announced that India would be establishing its own answer to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Dubbed the Indian Network for Climate Change Assessment (INCCA), the network was established in October last year at the initiative of the Environment Minister, Jairam Ramesh, but has taken on an enhanced role in the wake of criticism of the IPCC and a recognition of the weakness of Indian climate science.

The INCCA is made up of 200 scientists from 120 institutions across the country and will focus on the “three M’s” – measuring, modeling and monitoring. It will expected to issue its first report by November 2010 and will contribute formally to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report due to be released in 2014.

Minister Ramesh said the intention of forming the INCCA was not to snub the IPCC but to provide a regional response as “India as a large and diverse country cannot depend only on IPCC reports” to formulate its climate action strategies. Foreign experts and scientists from surrounding countries including Nepal are also expected to be engaged in INCCA.

Per capita approach to be revisited?

In another recent development, Minister Jairam Ramesh announced in February that he has commissioned US-based Indian economist Arvind Subramaniam to evaluate the per capita approach that has long been the bedrock for India’s climate negotiations. While Indian newspapers were full of speculation that Ramesh intends to junk the per capita approach, the case Subramaniam appears to have made in the past is an argument for the per-capita approach.

Leading Indian negotiator Ambassador Chandrashekhar Dasgupta, in a column in the Indian newspaper Telegraph, wrote that the Minister had commissioned Subramaniam to prepare a “paper on alternative options”. Dasgupta seemed perturbed at the prospect of the paper being commissioned, possibly fearing it being implemented on the “whim” of a single person (Ramesh) as opposed to the supposed consensus of the entire nation.

However, previous research by Arvind Subramaniam and his colleagues (May 2009) – and the likely reason that the Minister commissioned the study – calls for a “new per capita approach”. Subramanian et al’s approach takes into account the gravity of the climate crisis and seeks to show India as a responsible emerging power attempting to secure its growth.

In their approach, per capita emissions are broken down into emissions that disentangle pure energy consumption (for welfare), from the efficiency of CO2 emissions generated by production and consumption. This breaking up of emission “sources” highlights the high levels of inefficiency in production in developing countries, as opposed to the very high levels of energy consumption in developed countries. Their argument is that while countries such as India will strive towards emissions intensity that reflects today’s technological frontiers (1990-2005) in terms of welfare emissions, there will be no compromise on the country’s future development trajectory.

Old wine in new bottles? It remains to be seen just how different the Subramaniam study will be to the orthodoxy followed in India for more than a decade.

Climate skeptics get platform in Delhi

The Liberty Institute and the India International Centre teamed up to organise a tub-thumbing anti-climate science seminar on 23 February in New Delhi. Called Challenging Climate Post Copenhagen India, the seminar featured two professional climate deniers, Dr. Fred Singer (founder director, Science and Environment Policy project) and Dr Benny Peiser (Director, Global Warming Policy Foundation) from the UK.

A reprise of a similar event organized by the Liberty Institute in May 2008, this year’s event failed to attract the official participation the former event had. While the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, Dr Montek Singh Ahluwalia, himself had keynoted the Liberty Institute’s former event, this year the official representation was thin. One of the star turns promised – Dr Prodipto Ghosh, former Principal Secretary, Ministry of Environment & Forests, and redoubtable climate negotiator and member of the PM’s Advisory Council on Climate Change – failed to show up, being warned away no doubt.

Undeterred, the foreign visitors laid out their wares and made a hard sell to attract as many senior Indian scientists, foreign policy elites and opinion shapers to their cause. Evidently the idea behind the event was to create a critical mass and build a solid grouping of authoritative commentators who could deter the public from listening to pro-climate voices in India.

The primary arguments to doubt the ‘conventional wisdom’ on climate change presented by Drs Singer and Peiser are worth laying out in some detail as an illustration of the methods used:

1. Do we know enough that global warming is caused by humans?
2. The biggest problem facing the humanity is not climate change but the political messaging of creating fear, and the control of cheap and plentiful energy use which is important for poverty alleviation and development.
3. Climate Change is cause by neutral and natural forces not human beings
4. The IPCC exaggerated impacts. Climategate, Glaciergate, Amazongate and many more errors illustrate this. The IPCC misused and misinterpreted data. It misused and manipulated the peer review process – opting for selective data sets based on human influence and ignoring other factors
5. The last 10 years of data show no correlation between CO2 and global warming. Need to differentiate surface and atmospheric temperature.
6. Solar activity and cosmic rays released have an indirect impact on climate. Water vapour is a more potent GHG gas than CO2 but has been totally ignored and is not under control of human beings.
7. For another 20-30 years, we will not know who is wrong or who is right (who has better evidence – climate skeptics or climate pros?)
8. The climate negotiations are totally political and do not depend on science.
9. The European Union’s climate policy is in serious crisis as the Copenhagen Accord was reached without the EU’s participation
10. In Britain, energy intensive companies (although few) are slowly becoming less competitive due to enormous carbon and green taxes
11. Citizens in Britain pay more than 10% of their income for electricity – leading to energy / fuel poverty
12. There is a backlash of people in the EU and North America against climate policy
13. Solar will never be competitive in another few years as it did not happen in last 30 years
14. The EU has three options post Copenhagen;Carbon tax on all imports if other countries don’t take carbon reduction targets;Targets are conditional based on other countries – especially on Indian and Chinese commitments; Close eyes and pretend that nothing has changed. In Mexico, we will solve the problem.
15. In the US one sees serious opposition within Obama’s own party
16. The political climate has changed drastically in last two years

Relying on a devious combination of outright falsehood, innuendo and plausible political commentary, the duo set out to cast doubt in the minds of those present on the veracity of climate science and the merit of a country like India taking (costly) action on climate change. A false dichotomy was set up between development and taking action on climate change. Little mention was made of a precautionary or risk management approach to the issue, especially for a country as highly vulnerable to climatic variability such as India.

The Indian discussants present chimed in to support the main speakers, however.

Dr. Dev Raj Sikka, former director, Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology agreed that the IPCC is biased and charged that social scientists were kept away from the Panel’s work. He stated that the medieval warm period of 1300-1600 was warmer than now with fewer numbers of droughts. He noted that glaciers are indeed melting but this is a period of deglaciation, and such melting is part of the natural cycle. He admitted that models show that temperature and climate will change but said the extent of the change is still debatable. In sum, he argued that the Indian scientific community needs to be aware of “both sides of the story”.

In his remarks, Prof. Deepak Lal from the University of California, laid the problem at the door of population and said that ecologists and greens had always been against population growth. He argued that all multilateral environmental organizations such as the IPCC, the 1992 Rio Conference (Earth Summit) and the UN Environment Programme were tainted political organizations.

In the discussion that followed, the IPCC and Dr Pachauri came in for much criticism and few pulled their punches in expressing their views.

Clearly there is a role in the debate for contrarian views, but Messrs Singer and Peiser are so far off the curve that it makes one wonder what the India International Centre is doing giving them a platform. Or is the country’s most prestigious foreign policy centre a haven for closet climate skeptics? Perhaps the IIC could redress the balance by hosting an event with CSM next …
 
Maldives seeks India’s help

The Maldives hit international prominence last year with the efforts of the media-savvy President Nasheed to highlight the country’s acute vulnerability to climate change. One of the most low-lying countries in the world, the Maldives has now sought India’s cooperation to access new technologies particularly renewable energy, and data gathering to tackle climate change.

Vice president Mohammed Waheed Hassan said that Asian countries should pool their resources and create a fund without waiting for help from developed countries.

Green Commonwealth Games?

India took its first steps towards hosting the world’s first “Green” Commonwealth Games (CWG), when New Delhi’s chief minister Sheila Dixit and Suresh Kalmadi, Chairman of the XIXth CWG, released an Ecological Code on 17 February. The ecological code aims to minimise the impact of the Games on energy and water consumption, air quality and on the release of carbon dioxide emissions. The Ecological Code is promoted jointly by the CWG Committee and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and the organizers say it will be pushed out strongly in the eight months remaining until the start of the CWG.

UNEP has been advising the CWG to ensure that international best practice is adopted to green this event ever since it signed a MOU with the Commonwealth Games Organising Committee (CWOC) in 2007. (UNEP was also the key advisor for the Beijing Olympics, as well as the Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket tournament.)

Among the measures adopted by Delhi in its efforts to reduce the carbon footprint of the Games, has been the closure of one of the city’s coal-fired power plants. The CWOC is also reportedly looking at recycling waste generated during the games and offsetting emissions through a plantation drive. The city’s Thyagraj Stadium has incorporated rain water harvesting and used recycled bricks and rooftop solar panels in its construction – making it one of the greenest stadia in the country.

With one of the largest CNG-run bus fleets in the world and a metro in the process of enlargement, Delhi is inching its way towards a more sustainable transport infrastructure. Can more be done in the coming eight months given the controversy that has dogged the Games? If the CWOC is to be believed, more must be done to live up to the carbon neutral claims made by the organizers. If so, it will surely go down as the greenest sporting event in India of recent times.

Indian states get active on climate change

Himachal Pradesh

Himachal Pradesh is already ahead of most of India’s 25 states when it comes to taking green initiatives and is on its way to becoming the country’s first carbon neutral state by increasing its forest cover and earning carbon credits.  The state also notched another ‘first’ when it sent its Chief Minister to visit another country to gain exposure on best practice on climate action.

In 2008, Himachal announced its Environment Master Plan. Some of the initiatives under this Master Plan include the complete banning of felling and plastics, as well as a ban on setting up highly polluting industrial units in the state. The state also levies an innovative voluntary ‘green tax’ on vehicles to generate funds for climate change initiatives. Furthermore, all government buildings have been given a mandate to undertake environmental auditing.

The latest initiative was Chief Minister Dhumal’s visit to Costa Rica (9-17 February, 2010), to learn about how that renowned Central American state managed to increase its forest cover so successfully. Costa Rica’s lessons are apparently to be incorporated in HP’s Master Plan to increase the green cover in the state.

During his overseas visit, the Chief Minister also announced the establishment of a climate research centre for the state which would help it in tackling natural disasters such as earthquakes, landslides, glaciers outbursts and flash floods, and devise suitable adaptive and mitigation strategies.

He also met the heads of various NRI (Non-resident Indian) organisations in the United States and invited them to invest in the eco-friendly industrial development of the state.

In related action, the World Bank has agreed to give a Programmatic Development Policy Loan of $450 million to Himachal Pradesh for sustainable environmental growth, as well as a loan for watershed management – to be sanctioned once WB officials visit the state in March 2010.

Orissa

The Eastern state of Orissa has faced as many as eight cyclones – including one super cyclone – seventeen droughts and twenty floods in four decades (1965-2006). With these impacts uppermost in their minds, the Orissa government is in the process of finalising a State Action Plan on Climate Change with the support of DFID and the World Bank. Several rounds of meetings between state officials and representatives from both DFID and World Bank have been held in this regard. The Orissa government is planning to set up nine sectoral committees which would focus on nine impact areas of climate change including health and social vulnerability, energy, transport, agriculture, urban development, water resources, coastal and disaster, mining and forests. These committees would be headed by the secretaries of the respective state government departments, and the government is in the process of nominating nodal officers for each of the nine committees. After final rounds of meetings in March, the SAP (State Action Plan) on Climate Change is expected to be finalised by April 2010.

Gujarat

Gujarat’s canny state government has taken a lead in combating the effects of climate change in the state, as the commercial benefits thereof become evident. The government plans to invest a total of Rs. 3,600 crore over the next few years on climate change initiatives and Chief Minister Narendra Modi has allocated Rs. 100 crore to the state government’s Climate Change Department for its work. The main focus of action will be reducing the state’s total greenhouse gas emissions and thereby earning carbon credits.

The Climate Change Department – only the fourth such in the world – will work on a wide range of projects including research, development and commercialisation of green technology; research on impacts of climate change on agriculture and health; awareness and advocacy on climate change issues; and launching the Green credit movement. The state government is also in the process of finalising a State Action Plan on climate change which will include separate plans for each district bearing in mind regional environmental concerns.

Madhya Pradesh

Following in the footsteps of Himachal and Gujarat, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan of Madhya Pradesh announced the establishment of a climate research centre for the state recently. This would focus on collecting data on climate change impacts on the state and thus help in formulating effective mitigation strategies. However, no timeline or date by which this centre will be established and fully functional has been announced by the Chief Minister.

Delhi Sustainable Development Summit 2010

Post-Copenhagen Delhi witnessed the first major gathering of a large number of present and former heads of states, several ministers, representatives from various research and developmental organisation, non-governmental organisations, academia, professionals, corporate sector and media, from around the world – at TERI’s tenth Delhi Sustainable Development Summit on 5 February 2010 in the capital city.

The three-day summit, called ‘Beyond Copenhagen: new pathways to sustainable development,’ included sessions addressing everything from accelerating socio-economic development as a key to adaptation, to building institutions for effective climate governance, and financing opportunities.

Coming at a time when both the IPCC and its Chair – and DSDS host – Dr Rajendra Pachauri, had come under sustained assault in the press, both featured heavily in speeches and discussions at the Summit. In his inaugural address, the Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh said he fully supported the IPCC and its leadership. He also highlighted the efforts India has taken on climate change and referred to the country’s leadership at Copenhagen, especially in securing the Copenhagen Accord which the government welcomed. However, he maintained that India will forward a catalogue of voluntary commitments to the UNFCCC and not commit to a set of negotiated legal obligations.

Other keynote speakers included Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh; Prime Minister’s special envoy on climate change, Shyam Saran; former Executive Secretary of UNFCCC, Yvo de Boer; and Prof. Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University.

When he took to the stage, Jairam Ramesh, in a show of solidarity gave a hug to the IPCC Chair and TERI head, Dr Pachauri, seeking to dispel rumours of bad blood between the two men.

In his address, Yvo de Boer said that Post-Copenhagen, the UNFCCC had received indications in the form of targets and commitments from 56 nations accounting for 80 percent of GHG emissions but there is was still need for further effort. He listed the main challenges needing to be tackled as: unsustainable lifestyles globally; an ever-increasing population and rising demand; lack of good economics on why the present development model was unsustainable; and very few countries willing to undertake initiatives.

Despite the attacks on climate science of late and on the credibility of the IPCC in particular, there was unanimous agreement from speakers at the Summit on the problems associated with climate change, and consensus that serious impacts were in store if substantial efforts to cut GHG emissions were not undertaken swiftly.

Indo-UK study looks at water cycle changes

India and the UK signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on research co-operation to study changing water cycles on 17 February in New Delhi. The MoU was signed between Ministry of Science and Technology, Prithviraj Chavan, and UK Minister for Business, Innovation and Skills, Pat McFadden, as part of bilateral efforts to promote scientific exchange. The collaborating partners under the MoU would be the UK Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the Indian Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES).

Changes in the global water cycle as a result of climate change pose a serious threat to society and currently there is insufficient data to accurately predict its implications for monsoon patterns in India. Since most of India’s agriculture depends on monsoon rainfall it is all the more important to study changes in the water cycle such that crop patterns can be adjusted accordingly and help mitigate the effects of climate change on agriculture.

Under this collaboration scientists from both the UK and India will jointly study changing rainfall patterns, with the improved information exchange resulting in better flood and drought mapping and predictions for both India and the UK. This is intended to help increase the preparedness of different states to natural calamities and address the issues of food security, loss of livelihood and loss of property.

At present UK and Indian scientists are already working to improve the prediction of floods and drought in India and NERC has committed £10 million towards this as part of its Changing Water Cycle Programme.

Events Round-up for February 2010

1. Delhi Sustainable Development Summit, 5-7 February 2010, New Delhi: Organised by TERI with the central theme, Beyond Copenhagen: new pathways to sustainable development.
2. CII-The Ashden Awards for Sustainable Energy Conference, 8 February 2010, New Delhi: Organised by CII the conference gave a common platform to senior government officials, global investors and leading Indian entrepreneurs to discuss the promotion of the exciting potential of renewable energy to millions of people across India. Delegates discussed how renewable technologies could be scaled up at the national level, and the role business could play in improving livelihoods, health and education opportunities whilst tackling climate change.
3. Environment Partnership Summit 2010, 11-13 February 2010, Kolkata: This summit was organised by the Indian Chamber of Commerce for preparing a road map for global competitiveness and brought together multiple stakeholders discussing on a wide range of focus areas including carbon oriented economy, current clean technologies, water and waste water management in an industrial setup, environment management and environment health and safety.
4. Global Warming and CC: The Copenhagen Summit Talks, 13 February 2010, Jadavpur: Organised by Dr. Sugata Hazra this summit witnessed some distinguished speakers reflecting on climate change, and achievements and failures post Copenhagen summit.