Journal articles

Climate Policy

Energy Transitions

Using a mixed methodology of expert elicitation and system dynamics modelling, this article examines the policy gap that needs to be bridged for India to realize its net zero by 2070 commitment. The study discusses a socio-economically sensitive policy mix that could set India on a trajectory to peak its emissions in a decade and zero out its carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by mid-century, leaving about one gigaton of other greenhouse gases to be decarbonized by 2070 to meet India’s net-zero goal.

Issue briefs

Climate Policy

An overview of key issues to watch in discussions on the New Collective Quantified Goal (NCQG), including the role and relevance of the NCQG, strategies for effective implementation, and implications of the outcome for broader climate diplomacy.

Reports

Climate Policy

Energy Transitions

As India aims to further ramp up the pace of its RE deployment, both large- and small-scale, this brief, published in collaboration with DIW Berlin, analyzes challenges to it from regulatory, institutional mandate, coordination and market development angles, and explores ways to address them.

Journal articles

Climate Policy

Energy Transitions

This collaborative article by experts from 24 Indian institutions explores India’s path to net zero by 2070 through 3 broad dimensions – ‘national and sub-national perspectives’, ‘sectoral and technological transitions’ and ‘enablers’. Aditya Valiathan Pillai wrote on climate institutions as a key enabler in the process. He examines how India has performed in building climate institutions, the challenges that lie in building them, and how we can create an effective institutional structure that differs from ones in countries that are past their emissions peak.

Opinions

Climate Policy

While it may be in the interests of developing countries to do development differently for climate reasons, the technological fact of falling renewable energy prices by no means imply a post-equity climate politics. But with weak prospects for a grand global bargain around climate and development, we may be in for messy country-by-country approaches to low-carbon development transitions.

Opinions

Climate Policy

The Ranjitsinh ruling of the Supreme Court is potentially far-reaching but its limited view of action on climate change risks causing an inadequate framing of policy. It is legislation that is built on a bottom-up approach that can act on the Court’s calls for balance across multiple objectives.

Books and book chapters

Climate Policy

Transforming towards a low-carbon, climate-resilient society will require reimagining existing governance arrangements. This chapter in ‘The Oxford Handbook of Environmental and Natural Resources Law in India’ documents how India’s policies, institutions, and legal structures have changed in response to climate change.

Opinions

Climate Policy

Authors lay out an institutional vision for India’s climate law – knowledge-based ‘low-carbon development commission’; ‘climate cabinet’ to drive strategy; executive coordination body; and mechanisms for federal engagement.

Opinions

Climate Policy

Because India is still developing, is highly vulnerable, and yet to build much of its infrastructure, what the country needs is a law that enables progress toward both low-carbon and climate resilient development.