3. ENERGY AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris Agreement with considerable mitigation efforts taking into account India’s low per capita emissions and its development priorities.

Energy, environment and sustainable development: An integrated policy response in the context of SDGs

The way energy is produced and consumed is key to delivering India’s sustainable development objectives. The country’s substantial and sustained economic growth will require extensive energy resources. Energy policies play an essential role in driving economic growth and providing access to affordable modern energy services as a prerequisite for eliminating poverty and reducing inequalities.

At the same time, energy is a major source of negative environmental externalities, such as air pollution that causes severe health problems in India and around the world, and it is also the principal source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, making the energy sector a key component in climate change adaptation and mitigation.

The SDGs, unanimously adopted by the United Nations, provide an internationally recognised framework for key development objectives, including specific targets to measure progress. At national level, India has already set itself ambitious targets in several SDGs areas, such as economic progress and reducing poverty, inclusiveness and sustainability (see also RIS [2016]). The scope of sustainable energy is primarily covered by SDG7, but other SDGs, notably SDG3 on health (including the severe impacts of air pollution) as well as SDG13 on climate, are closely linked to the energy sector.

The three key targets that embody the SDG7 objective to “ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all” are also central to India’s current energy challenge of: 1) universal access for all, 2) ambitious scale-up of renewable energy and 3) enhanced energy efficiency.

To be successful, a sustainable energy transition needs to simultaneously address the interlinked challenges of economic development, energy security and enhanced economic competitiveness, while at the same time fulfilling sustainable development objectives including promoting energy access, reducing air pollution and preventing climate change.

Air quality, climate adaptation and mitigation, and energy access challenges should therefore be addressed simultaneously in an integrated response. In particular, air quality and climate policies require some of the same set of response measures, creating opportunities for synergies, cost-effectiveness and complementarity of policy combinations. This can accelerate the clean energy transition and the achievement of multiple policy objectives.

The following sections discuss progress made in India with regard to these three pillars of sustainable development. The sections also outline future trends, based on stated policies alone.