A dog looks out as noxious fumes eminate from fissures in the ground in the village of Jina Gora on February 11, 2012 near Jharia, India. Villagers in India’s Eastern State of Jharkhand scavenge coal illegally from open-cast coal mines to earn a few dollars a day. Claiming that decades old underground burning coal seams threatened the homes of villagers, the government has recently relocated over 2300 families to towns like Belgaria. Villagers claim they were promised schools, hospitals and free utilities for two years, which they have not received. As the world’s power needs have increased, so has the total global production of coal, nearly doubling over the last 20 years according to the World Coal Association. (Photo by Daniel Berehulak /Getty Images)
India’s new Prime Minister Narendra Modi has set ambitious new targets for reducing coal consumption and scaling up renewables. India will double the tax on coal production, promote renewable energy projects and electric vehicles to balance out emissions from coal-fired power plants.
“With regard to coal, there’s a need to find a balance between taxing pollution and the price of power,” Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said. – As reported by Bloomberg
India is under growing international pressure to make carbon emission reduction commitments in the lead up to the Paris Climate Talks later this year. The US and China made announcements setting out targets for their countries, but India resisted, citing the need for industrial development, power generation expansion and economic growth.
About one-third of India’s 1.25 billion people don’t have access to electricity, depriving them of basic health and education services, while frequent blackouts cripple industrial output and increase production costs.
India plans to add 175 gigawatts of renewable-generation capacity by 2022, including 100 gigawatts from solar. That will help more than double the share of renewables in the mix of fuel it consumes from the current 6 percent.
India is also gradually ending subsidies for fossil fuels and has levied taxes on gasoline and diesel to fund new roads.
