Glasgow COP26: India's emissions growing faster than most nations'

In 2019, India's carbon dioxide emissions grew 3.7%, the corresponding increase for China and Russia was 0.7%

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has set 2070 as the target year for India to achieve net-zero emissions and promised a green India by 2030. But even as the target announced at the COP26 Summit in Glasgow is 49 years away, an analysis of data shows that India was already on its way to reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

Carbon emissions in 2019, according to Our World in Data, increased 3.7 per cent year-on-year (YoY). The growth rate was 3.8 per cent in 2001. In the subsequent years, it peaked at 7.5 per cent. The growth rate has been falling since 2009.

However, at 3.7 per cent India’s emissions are still growing faster than most other major economies. The emissions in China, which emits four times more carbon dioxide than India, grew 0.7 per cent in 2019, whereas the US, which has double India’s emissions, reduced its emissions by 1 per cent. Among its BRICS peers, Brazil witnessed a 2.3 per cent contraction in carbon emissions, while South Africa saw a 0.1 per cent decline. India ranks third after China and the US in global CO2 emissions. It accounts for 7.2 per cent of the global emissions.

The only economy to trump India was Vietnam where emissions grew 9.5 per cent. However, Vietnam’s growth came at a very low base — it emits only a tenth of India’s annual carbon capacity.

In per capita terms, India performs much better than all other economies. Its per capita emissions were just 1.91 tonnes, whereas China averaged 7.38 tonnes and the US averaged 16.06 tonnes. Even Brazil, South Africa, Russia and Vietnam had higher per capita emissions than India. India has promised to reduce carbon emissions by 1 billion tonnes by 2030. According to the Climate Action Tracker, with its current policies, India will be producing 4 billion tonnes of carbon by 2030.