Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in a meeting with UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) President Alok Sharma on Wednesday said that India is on track to meet the goals of the Paris agreement.
During the meeting, Sitharaman said that the government is taking concrete steps and at appreciable speed to meet its commitments on the target of 450 gigawatts (Gw) of renewable energy by 2030, PTI reported. Of this 100GW of this renewable energy had already been achieved.
The minister also highlighted the extensive groundwork done by the government for the new hydrogen energy mission.
Union Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav during the meeting said, “India believes that climate actions must be nationally determined and strongly advocates that the differentiation and operationalization of flexibility provided in the UNFCCC and Paris Agreement for developing countries should be at the core of decision making.”
According to PTI, Sitharaman also expressed hope that the commitment made by the developed countries to provide $100 billion per year to developing countries would be achieved and was optimistic about a positive outcome on the new collective goals on finance in COP 26.
Alok Sharma said in the meeting, “We have no time to waste. The recent IPCC report represents a flashing red on the climate emergency dashboard. But, the report also said that the door is still open on keeping global temperature rises to 1.5 degrees, but we need to act now. Minister Bhupender Yadav and I reviewed the issues that were raised at the July ministerial meeting and we agreed to continue to cooperate very closely together to ensure COP26 keeps 1.5 degrees Celsius within reach.”
At a media roundtable on Wednesday, Sharma also noted that India is already on track to overachieve its current nationally determined contributions (NDC).
