EU highlights India’s potential to mitigate carbon emissions

The executive vice president of the European Commission and head of the Green Deal, Frans Timmermans, highlighted on Friday the “great potential” of India, which will support the European Union (EU), for the development of ecological projects that contribute to reducing global emissions. of coal.

Financial investment

The country needs financial investment and defined plans that “redirect the money that is invested in coal towards renewable energies”, a task for which the Indian authorities have shown a favorable commitment, assured the vice president in a meeting with a small number of journalists in New Delhi.

In this sense, he emphasized the will of the European Union to cooperate with this Asian giant in guaranteeing “the best transition to end carbon emissions”.

“There are many things we can do together, and there is a strong will to partner in different areas,” Timmermans added.

He also explained that “given that India is going through a similar process” to the one the EU went through a long time ago in terms of reducing harmful particles for the environment, the European experience for this transition “will be useful”.

“India was a latecomer to development and therefore bears less of a responsibility” in this transition process, he said, adding, however: “At the end of the day, we all have to get out of the coal-based economy. and renew it. This is a fundamental change.”

alternative energy sources

The vice president considers that “there is no future for coal”, but to stop depending on its activity “is extremely complicated” due to the social and economic implications that it entails, especially for India, considered the third largest producer of this energy source, only behind the US and Chinese.

For this reason, it is important that India has alternatives and new opportunities that allow the economy to ‘decarbonize’ little by little, he noted.

Timmermans believes that India could benefit from wind and hydro power, sources that in Europe have brought positive results both in the economy and in the reduction of polluting gases.

The challenges of COP26

Timmermans’ visit comes just ten days before the start of the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow, Scotland.

The challenges of the summit are numerous, because as the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) stated in a report this week, the world’s governments plan to produce more than double the amount of fossil fuels in 2030 than would be compatible with limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees.

The aforementioned report also points out that the gap in the production of fossil energies -coal, oil and gas- has remained practically unchanged since 2019, for which it appeals to all governments to guarantee that the ecological transition, beyond fossil fuels be fair and equitable.

According to that document, India committed in 2016 to a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, compared to 2005 levels, of between 33% and 35% by 2030.

But in contrast to that announcement, the Indian authorities last year drafted a plan for the exploitation of natural resources in which they planned to expand coal production between 2019 and 2024 by about 60% (from 730 to 1,149 tons).

Source: EFE Green