India has joined the U.S. and China in pledging to sign the Paris Agreement at the first possible moment, on April 22 during a formal signing ceremony. The three counties are the top three greenhouse gas emitters in the world. “The COP 21 agreement would be ratified at a high-level signing ceremony to be convened at the UN Headquarters in New York on April 22,” The Economic Times quoted Indian Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar as saying Saturday at a symposium at the University of Mumbai.
The Paris Agreement, adopted in December at the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, is the world’s first universal climate change agreement, soliciting contributions from both developed and developing nations. The agreement takes effect when at least 55 of the 197 member states to the UNFCCC, representing at least 55 percent of total global greenhouse gas emissions, have signed it.
India is responsible for roughly 4 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, according to data from the UNFCCC. That is well below China’s roughly 20 percent and the United States’ 18 percent. If the member countries of the European Union, which account for 12 percent of emissions, and any other country contributing more than .8 percent to global emissions sign the agreement on April 22, the 55 percent of greenhouse gas emissions requirement will be met.
These percentages are based on the most recent emissions data reported to the UNFCCC by each country. Unfortunately because the data is self-reported by the nations, there is not a consistent baseline. While more recent data may be available from other sources, the 55 percent requirement for the Paris Agreement to come into force is based on the UNFCCC numbers.
U.S. President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping last week announced that their nations will sign the Paris climate change agreement on April 22. The two leaders issued a joint presidential statement signaling their commitment to “take their respective domestic steps in order to join the Agreement as early as possible this year.”
In its intended nationally determined contribution to the Paris Agreement, India pledged to reduce the emissions intensity of its GDP by 33 to 35 percent by 2030 from 2005 levels. The country intends to reach this goal in part by increasing the amount of electric power installed capacity from non-fossil fuel-based energy resources to about 40 percent by that time.
