By Mayank Bhardwaj
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – India will use next week’s U.N. climate conference to urge rich countries to keep their promise to give $100 billion a year in funding to help developing nations deal with climate change and switch to cleaner energy, two government sources said.
New Delhi will also reiterate its commitment to doing its best to help slow global warming at the COP27 event, the sources said.
“The cost of both decarbonisation and coping with the impact of climate change will be huge and that is why those who have disproportionately contributed to greenhouse gas emissions shouldn’t delay the funding,” one of the sources said.
“And that is why India will speak for itself and other developing nations to ensure that there is a clear, complete roadmap for the funding that should immediately start flowing,” he added.
In 2009, the developed countries most responsible for global warming pledged to provide $100 billion per year by 2020 to help developing nations deal with its consequences.
The commitment has still not been met, generating mistrust and reluctance among some developing nations to accelerate their emissions reductions.
India, is the world’s third largest emitter of greenhouse gases after China and the United States – though it is much lower down the rankings of emissions per capita, according to Our World Data.
It has been ramping up its share of renewable energy, but coal continues to be India’s main fuel for power generation, as the country strives to provide energy for its 1.4 billion people using a cheaper fuel.
The sources said India had already initiated steps such as meeting half of its energy demand from non-fossil fuels and building 500 gigawatts of non-fossil energy capacity by 2030.
“These goals need a lot of money and that is why it is important to press for the implementation of climate actions promised by developing countries,” the second source said.
“Developed countries also need to realise that overall costs have gone up, so the pledge to provide $100 billion per year cannot be static. It needs to go up.”
(Reporting by Mayank Bhardwaj; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
