Prime Minister Narendra Modi announces his government will ratify the climate agreement on Gandhi's birthday
India will ratify the Paris Agreement on October 2, the birthday of Mahatma Gandhi, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced yesterday.
The announcement, widely reported in India's national press, will come exactly a year to the day since India submitted its national climate action plan - or Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC) in UN jargon - to the UN climate change secretariat.
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The plan commits India to cutting emissions intensity by up to 35 per cent against 2005 levels and securing around 40 per cent of the country's power from non-fossil fuel sources by 2030.
India's ratification will follow a flurry of official approvals for the deal last week at a ratification ceremony at the UN headquarters in New York, which saw 31 countries formally join the climate treaty.
So far, 61 countries, representing 47.79 per cent of global emissions, have ratified.
In order to come into force, at least 55 countries, representing at least 55 per cent of global emissions, must ratify the Agreement. India's ratification will bring this threshold within touching distance - the country represents 4.1 per cent of global emissions according to World Resources Institute (WRI), so its contribution will take the ratified emissions total up to 51.89 per cent of global emissions.
UN officials have now signalled it is almost certain the climate treaty will enter force this year, two years earlier than originally planned.
The European Union, which represents 28 Member States and 12.1 per cent of global emissions, is reportedly in discussions to 'fast-track' its ratification procedure to formally join the pact in the coming weeks, a move which would trigger the Agreement's entry into force.
In related news, Sir David King, the British foreign secretary's special representative on climate change, has said China's plans to introduce a national cap-and-trade scheme in 2017 is likely to accelerate the country's transition away from coal power to cleaner sources of energy.
"I think it is going to be very, very good for the Chinese economy," he said last week during a visit to Shanghai, according to online news site Sixth Tone.
King added a carbon trading scheme will break the "inertia" in the current energy system, which he said leads to the construction of new coal-fired power stations over newer, cleaner generating sources.
Under the Paris Agreement China has promised to peak its emissions and generate a fifth of its electricity from clean sources by 2030, alongside cutting the carbon intensity of its economy by 60 per cent.
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