Carbonating India

Cleo Paskal

There is now widespread scientific consensus that human-produced carbon emissions are contributing to global climate change. It may not be the only cause, and global feedback mechanisms (like the release of huge stores of the greenhouse gas methane from the melting permafrost) could be too far advanced to stop, but the political reality is that there is growing pressure for a global framework to curb carbon emissions.

The EU is working hard, at all levels, hoping to position itself as the world agenda-setter in carbon-related issues. They are benefiting from the US' official absence from the international negotiations. But individual US States and cities are actively enacting their own legislation, making it very likely that, after the next US national election, the US will jump fully into the global carbon debate.

China is trying to position itself as the voice of the developing world, while at the same time trying to use the EU position to its own advantage (i.e. there is currently a proposal on the table for Germany to relax its intellectual property rights legislation in regards China so it is easier for companies like Siemens to transfer 'carbon friendly' technology. This is not a concession that China is looking to extend to other members of the developing world).
Meanwhile, seen from the outside, India seems to be decidedly behind in positioning itself in relations to the new realities. It is neither leading the debate, nor benefiting from the current construct.

The political component of carbon

Apart from reducing emissions, the carbon issue is also being used to advance various ancillary agenda, such as those relating to energy security, protectionism, subsidies and trade tariffs. All too often, cutting carbon emissions is used as a justification and impetus for an existing policy that, when more closely examined, gives little to no carbon cutting benefits. For example, cutting carbon emissions is being used to justify:

* A push for various biofuels, even though many, at their current stage of development, can often take as much fossil fuel, or more, to grow and process than they replace at the pump. In the US, ethanol has mostly been an excuse for more agricultural subsidies.

The shift from food crops to fuel crops has done little to promote energy security, meanwhile it has depleted valuable water reserves, put a strain on global food supply and contributed (along with extreme climate patterns) to precipitous food price inflation. In some places it is also resulting in deforestation that reduces the global carbon sink, compounding the net increase in emissions.

In Europe, where there are dwindling domestic fossil fuel supplies, 'climate security' is politically often closely linked with 'energy security'. The push for alternate and renewable sources may have received its biggest political boost not from climate-related science, but from Russia showing a willingness to play politics with its fuel supply. Therefore, it makes sense from an EU point of view to encourage global policies that favour those that cut down on fossil fuel use as it reinforces the EU's existing goal of trying to create more energy independence for security reasons.

* The increasing push to rate food/products by 'food miles' (or the distance the food traveled to get to the shop). In the UK, food that has been flown in is now commonly labeled with 'By air' tags in large grocery stores to encourage buyers to focus on local or shipped products. This is in effect morally-backed protectionism and is sometimes based on faulty logic. For example, one study has shown that the carbon footprint of cut flowers flown in from Kenya was much lower than those grown in Europe because of the fuel needed to heat the greenhouses in colder climates;