IndiaPost.com - 'Emission cuts will lead to a clean energy economy'

India Post News Service

Solar energy is like dollar bills lying on the sidewalk, we just have to pick them up," said RK Pachauri, who was the joint winner of last year's Nobel Peace Prize along with Al Gore for his work on climate change. About 1.6 billion people around the world lack access to electricity - a quarter of them, or 400 million people, in India.

India is the world's fourth largest emitter of carbon dioxide gas - the main cause of global warming. But India till yet has made no commitment to cut its carbon emissions. The government argues that the per capita emission of Indians is far less than that generated by individuals in developed countries.

Last year, TERI launched a project to provide solar lanterns at a subsidized rate to those with no access to electric power. "Moving to solar lanterns can only be described as a win-win situation," he says. "It will reduce India's dependence on petrol and petroleum products. It will give access to millions of poor to lighting.

And the government would save a vast amount of money which it spends at the moment on providing subsided kerosene to the poor. "If we implement this action plan, we would certainly be on the right path and we would be doing what is expected of us," he said. Pachauri also defended India's position of not committing to cutting its carbon emissions which are predicted to rise.

"As incomes grow, over time people would aspire for more things like fans and refrigerators and air-conditioners which will add up to the emission levels," he said.

At this critical juncture, anything short of a major transition to a more sustainable pattern of development would turn the world into a "planet of slums" The cost of solar power is still very high, but as it develops and is used extensively the costs are bound to come down.

For wind energy too, the initial cost per unit was very high, but now it is as competitive as energy derived from fossil fuels. He feels that India's power crisis would be tackled with another step being taken by India, that is, the Indo-US nuclear deal. Pachauri said,"I thought that the deal that we had struck with the US, which our Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had sort of spent so much of time and effort in coming up with, should go through and I hope it goes through."

Pachauri also said that nuclear energy is a serious option for India. "I think in our country given the fact that we are going to have several problems with supply of fuels of all kinds, nuclear is a serious option and we need to look at it very carefully," he added.

Pachauri is trying his level best to have a healthy climate not just in India, but globally, too. In a recent visit to the US, Rajendra Pachauri, urged US lawmakers at all levels to make commitments to serious emissions cuts and lead the way for the world in a transition to a clean energy economy.

As for the G8 Summit's statement on climate change that included a pledge made by G8 leaders to at least halve global warming emissions by 2050, Pachauri feels that it had a major flaw. The world's wealthiest nations failed to specify a target for cutting greenhouse-gas emissions in the coming decade, a vital stepping stone for meeting the mid-century goal, said Rajendra Pachauri.

"There's a serious omission in terms of not addressing the Bali action plan, which has called for deep cuts in emissions by 2020," Pachauri said. "I think there should have been at least an endorsement, that the leaders of the G8 countries fully support actions to bring about those deep cuts," he said.

Pachauri said climate change was moving faster and more destructively than once thought and only seven years remained for decisive action. To limit global temperature increases at century's end to no more than 2.0 to 2.4 degrees Celsius (3.6 to 4.3 degrees Fahrenheit), emissions have to peak no later than 2015, he said.

"The sooner we start reducing emissions, the greater the likelihood of avoiding some of the more serious impacts and temperature increases that are going to take place a decade or so down the road," he said.

The cyclone that caused massive devastation in Burma and the extensive floods in Iowa, for instance are linked in the public perception to climate change, he said. "Public concerns in several parts of the world have been heightened to such an extent that extreme weather events are invariably attributed to climate change.

Never before has human society been gripped by such a strong realization of the need to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels - and even change our lifestyle - in order to reduce emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases."

Pachauri wrote, "The world has reached an unprecedented level of awareness of science behind climate change... a growing number of people - and not just typical environmentalists - now believe that climate change is not a concern for the distant future but something we are witnessing here and now."