Getting access to climate financing, already a tough act for developing countries, may become a lot harder with the US pulling out of the Paris Agreement.
US President Donald Trump declared on Wednesday that the world’s largest polluter would withdraw from the 2015 Paris climate accord, saying the deal punished America but benefited countries such as India and China.
The US is the largest contributor to the Green Climate Fund (GCF), the principal tool for underdeveloped and developing countries to get access to climate finance from richer nations.
Agreed upon by 195 nations, the Paris agreement committed the US and other countries to cap the global temperature at 2 degrees Celsius higher than pre-industrial level and "endeavour to limit" the rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
Apart from making it almost impossible for the world to attain this target now, environmentalists pointed out that “climate justice” and financing from rich nations to deal with global warming might become difficult for India.
"Even if other countries, including developing countries, raise their ambition, they will not be able to fill the void left by the US. It is, therefore, not sufficient to shift the burden of addressing climate change to other countries, including China and India," said Chandra Bhushan, deputy director-general at the Centre for Science and Environment.
India has thrown its weight behind "climate justice", whereby developing and underdeveloped nations that face the brunt of climate change are provided aid to cope with it. However, while all nations had politically agreed to climate justice at Paris, it found mention in the preamble of the final agreement.
With Trump now planning to begin negotiations to “re-enter” the accord so that the terms are “fair” for American citizens and workers, the issue may become even more hotly contested.
“India and China cannot be expected to fill the gap left by the US, either in terms of financial support or emission cuts,” said Indrajit Bose of the Third World Network.
The GCF set up under the UN oversees pledges by advanced economies to jointly mobilise $100 billion per year by 2020 to help poorer nations reduce greenhouse gas emissions and address the effects of climate change.
Established in 2010, the fund has taken years to get off the ground and has been widely criticised for lack of accountability and transparency.However, as of May 2017, the GCF has managed to approve about $10 billion for projects in developing countries. Over the past few months, the rate of approvals was gaining steam.
The US had pledged $3 billion, twice that of the second-largest pledger, Japan. Of this, the previous US administration had paid $1 billion.
This is expected to affect India’s climate goals as the country had targeted increasing its share of non-fossil fuel-based power capacity from the current 30 per cent to 40 per cent by 2030 with international support.
The issue of technology transfers to poorer nations at subsidised rates to allow them to withstand climate change is also a related one.
Trump has rightly pointed out that India will be doubling its coal production by 2020. Coal production of 1 billion tonnes by 2020 had been targeted by the government, more than double the 494.23 million tonnes in 2014-15, Power Minister Piyush Goyal informed the Lok Sabha in March.However, India had also set a goal of installing 175 gigawatts of renewable power capacity by 2022, environmentalists pointed out.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, currently in Russia as part of a multi- country foreign visit, has hinted that India will continue to honour the Paris agreement. The environment ministry was expected to discuss the matter with the PMO once Modi returned, an official said.
