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.

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.

The recent spate of deadly heatwaves highlights the need for long-term systemic solutions, which come with a hefty price tag. Here’s how India can foot the bill.

The combined impact of air pollution and heatwaves can be far more severe than individual impacts, as various reactions between heat and gases in the air can affect cardiovascular, respiratory and immune systems. Adopting unified protective health measures against both issues is crucial.

Policies that can usefully address climate change mitigation extend far beyond what an earlier literature defined as “mitigation policy”, which incorporates policy instrument design to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by means of, for instance, carbon tax, cap and trade, or border carbon adjustment. Instead, there is value in thinking much more expansively about climate policy: Effective “climate policy” may not always be “climate” policy.

Climate won’t be a major issue in India’s upcoming six-week-long national election, unlike in Australia, the UK, and US, where elections can hinge on climate policy positions. But it will shape Indian elections in definitive but under-the-radar ways.

In countries where politics are embedded in local development concerns such as job creation or environmental issues, an enabling approach to climate law may work better than a purely regulatory approach.

It absolves educational institutions and government agencies of their responsibility towards ensuring clean air while hampering learning outcomes.

The first Global Stocktake (GST) confirms that progress in reducing emissions is well behind what is required to limit global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. What is to be done?

Fossil fuels should be used sparingly, in the areas where they contribute most to human welfare.

Recent analysis has found that the finance that developed countries are reporting towards that USD 100 billion targets is not always going towards clear climate purposes – some of the projects that have been included in their reporting were a coal plant, a hotel expansion, chocolate stores, a movie, and an airport expansion.

States are critical actors in India’s energy transition as there is a multi-tier governance of energy production and usage.

India’s Long Term Low Emissions Development Strategy (LT-LEDS) sets out multiple low-carbon transitions, highlighting that climate action will be intimately tied to developmental processes.This article identifies some of the challenges and opportunities embedded within these transitions, and reflects on how these will impact developmental priorities such as employment and energy security.

India’s recent heat deaths are not outliers. They signal a dismal future unless we start taking the urgent threat of heat seriously.

​​The Indian government’s primary policy response to the life-threatening heat comes in the form of “heat action plans”. These plans urge a healthy mix of different solution types but most plans do not account for local context, are underfunded and are poor at identifying and targeting vulnerable groups.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change AR6 synthesis report is a sobering account of present and future damages to ecosystems.

India took on a key position on the world stage by assuming the presidency of G20. This year, India will aim to provide leadership to a group of countries that comprises 85% of the world’s GDP and 60% of its population. India must use its presidency to push for greater cooperation to combat complex climate issues.

India’s G-20 presidency is an opportunity for New Delhi to negotiate a deal for itself while also shaping international cooperation on just energy transitions.

The market must work in sync with a range of policy instruments. Stable institutional and regulatory structures must balance competing interests and trade-offs to ensure optimum coverage, caps, pricing and reporting.

With high water usage, questionable water quality and health risks, these methods have, at best, limited effects.

2023 should be the year climate change is mainstreamed into India’s development decisions.

With the new Loss and Damage fund, the line between victim and perpetrator has been blurred

COP27 will be marked for the loss and damage fund and stalled steps on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. But the time has arrived to focus on what nations are doing at home, not global meets.

Health must be turned into a feature and eventually a function of air pollution policy

Addressing climate change through policy may not be enough. Legislation around climate can ensure economy-wide outcomes. Broader political context will also need to be considered, in India as in the rest of the world, while drawing laws to ensure that both environmental and development objectives are met.

Starting with a governance functions approach – identifying the problems to be solved – allows legal reform to be tailored to disparate national contexts.

As India takes over the G20 presidency in December, LiFE offers a platform to promote individual-led demand-side interventions on the international stage.

As climate change becomes an increasing concern, addressing the problem only through policy may not be enough. In this piece, Dubash and Sridhar suggest that legislation around climate can ensure economy-wide outcomes, and put forth nine considerations that countries hoping to implement climate law should satisfy to effectively tackle climate change.

As key environmental indicators worsen across India, it is clear that State Pollution Control Boards and Pollution Control Committees are falling short in meeting their statutory mandate

For the annual climate meet to facilitate action across the developed and developing world and enhance equity, North-South tensions on loss and damage as well as finance need redressal

As COP27 approaches, the spotlight once again turns to building a compelling national narrative around climate change – based on what India can do and what India needs.

The boards were envisioned as autonomous entities, and strong political will coupled with bureaucratic support is required to realise this vision, even if it constrains the government’s (other) policy objectives.

The issue of crop stubble burning cannot be addressed in a silo and using short-term, unsustainable solutions

The creation of a national carbon market in India, depending on its institutional setup, policy integration and design could offer a mechanism to reduce emissions – or it could result in serious economic costs. The authors here put forth seven key considerations for its design – including India’s growth objectives, trade balance, fiscal revenues, and the effect on its MSMEs.

The creation of a national carbon market in India, depending on its institutional setup, policy integration, and design could offer a mechanism for reducing emissions, or it could result in serious economic costs.

Adaptation is best seen as a long-term anti-poverty measure whose policy relevance grows as the zone of climate vulnerability expands on the Indian map

For a climate-sensitive development plan, India must walk a line between the ‘development-first climate-later’ view and the ‘untrammelled opportunity’ view

A technological solution to renewable energy source’s intermittency is the physical storage of energy. Thus, storage technologies are critical to a transition to RE heavy energy systems.

As climate change has already affected what constitutes effective development, a growing, aspirational nation such as India needs to factor climate considerations into its vision of future development

The report fails to make its evaluations in an unbiased and rigorous manner.

In anticipation of India updating its Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), Aman Srivastava and Ashwini Swain evaluate the climate pledges made by Prime Minister Modi at COP26.

Methodology of Yale-Columbia Environmental Performance Index is indefensible, tone-deaf on ethics, ignorant of a long literature on climate equity, and inconsistent with broadly accepted politics.

Current short-term fixes for India’s power crisis neither address rising uncertainty in the electricity system nor are aligned to a transition towards a 21st century energy system.

India’s engagement in Glasgow, while storied and multi-faceted, also exposed faultlines in Indian climate politics; the faultlines in framing, policy, institutions, and diplomacy need to be addressed cogently if the country is to successfully negotiate the many transitions ahead.

The current crisis can be explained by a demand surge, supply disruptions and dysfunctional cash flow.

For a country like India, a policy package approach could help unlock the social acceptability of transformative action.

The latest IPCC report says the world is not on track for achieving the mitigation goals. The response to that should be to redouble efforts and limit harm to the extent possible

As the sea ravages coastal settlements, seawalls are springing up. But real solutions lie elsewhere, far away from the coast.

Air pollution is a national emergency. We must reject the discourse centred solely around Delhi and eschew the techno-fixes currently dominating the discourse and recognise the long-term transitions necessary to sustainably improve air quality.

सभी देशों की तरह भारत के लिए भी, जलवायु परिवर्तन एक अत्यंत तेजी से बढती समस्या बन गई है। इस लेख के जरिये पिल्लई एवं अन्य तर्क देते हैं कि इस समस्या के समाधान के लिए भारत की संघीय प्रणाली की पुनर्कल्पना करने की आवश्यकता है, क्योंकि भारत के संविधान में जलवायु संबंधी कई क्षेत्रों में राज्यों के महत्वपूर्ण कर्त्तव्य निर्धारित किये गए हैं। वे जलवायु नीति में संस्थागत सुधार हेतु एक नए दृष्टिकोण का सुझाव देते हैं, जो राष्ट्रीय लक्ष्यों के लिए अपने कार्यों का समन्वय करते हुए राज्यों को पर्याप्त लचीलापन देगा।

Addressing the issue of climate change requires reimagining Indian federalism, as the Indian Constitution gives states a crucial role in several arenas of climate action. The authors propose a new approach to institutional reform in climate policy, one that gives states adequate flexibility while coordinating their actions for national goals.

Air pollution is a complex societal problem. We must recognise this and focus our attention on long-term policy pathways with clear goals and timelines

The revised WHO guidelines are a clear nudge from the health sector towards the deep decarbonisation of India’s economy

To embark on a low-carbon development pathway, India will need an institutional architecture with a more strategic bent.

The Centre can play an important supporting role by providing credible analysis on low-carbon policy choices to the states when required.

India needs new dedicated organisations, policy frameworks, and financing mechanisms. Begin with a low-carbon development commission

Translating complex climate science into language people understand has always been difficult. At various times, the aim of different climate policies has been holding average global temperature rise to 2°C or 1.5°C, or ensuring emissions peak by a particular year. Net zero targets are the most recent attempt to simplify the climate crisis in order to make it manageable.

India needs a path that shows how a focus on opportunities for low-carbon development is more likely, in practice, to deliver emissions reductions than abstract future 2050 pledges

The Indian road to leadership should be based on near-term actions, institutional strengthening, and a combination of mid- and long-term targets

India’s new trade rules are political and an irritant; instead, New Delhi should be planning a stable institutional model

India has always argued that climate is linked to development choices, livelihoods and equity. Don’t ask activists to narrow down their concerns

Making information widely accessible to the people has been central to India’s COVID-19 response. So if governments were to raise awareness and disseminate information on air pollution the way they have done with COVID-19, what might that look like?

The environment ministry needs to be clear about its role — its mandate is to create and sustain a regulatory framework that prevents the plunder of our natural resources, not actively accelerate the pace of environmental devastation.

It offers some opportunities. But the key is in contesting bad policies, which dilute environmental norms, processes

India’s recent experiences, and successful global models, deliver a clear message- power pools can’t be built without an institutional architecture other countries trust

Policy ideas should marry employment and industrial priorities with green outcomes

We must use this critical juncture to push for positive reforms and overdue structural changes to build a resilient electricity future

There is a slump in demand for electricity. This will create a financial crisis. But can it lead to reforms?

If sustained, behavioural changes, induced by Covid-19, can alter the way we live and work

The Centre’s push for smart meters may be an important ingredient for transitioning to a 21st century electricity-system. However, let us not pretend it is the silver bullet to solve the long-standing problems of discom finance and losses.

On Delhi air pollution, the AAP government shouldn’t throw its hands up but formulate a concrete plan.

To tackle climate change, not only does India need to pivot into a low-carbon future, it also needs to step up as a leader of climate-vulnerable countries.