Jan. 20: To meet the deadline of January 31 for the submission of its emission targets under the Copenhagen Accord, the government on Wednesday kicked-off the process of chalking out a roadmap. It will also analyse the cost of low-carbon growth by constituting a committee under former Planning Commission member Kirit Parikh.
Sharing his views on the subject after the first meeting of the committee, Dr Parikh said, "We will identify various options and scope available to reduce energy use in major carbon emission sectors such as steel, power and agriculture."
The committee, which has been constituted by the Planning Commission, has been tasked to find ways to achieve 20-25 per cent reduction in emission intensity by 2010 on 2005 levels as was announced by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in 2008 at Copenhagen Summit.
Contradictory to the government’s claim that it does not need any international fund to meet the emission reduction targets, one of the main mandates of the committee is to make cost benefit analysis for the money to be required for mitigation to tackle climate change.
Dr Parikh said, "The committee will do a detailed analysis to find out whether or not it was possible to reach to that (announced) target without additional money."
Dr Parikh said, "The number (20-25 per cent) was based on the various studies made in the past and now we have to chalkout a roadmap and identify the additional cost if there are".
The 26-member committee, mostly drawn from among the private sector entities and experts, also proposes to work on identifying the viable policy action, which could be easily adopted by the stakeholders concerned.
