Economic Growth and Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Emissions: Policy Perspective from Past Indian Studies

Historically, the developed countries have been the chief contributors to global warming. But, lately, onus for the perpetuation and aggravation of the climate change problem is being increasingly shifted to the developing counties. Fast economic growth in these emerging countries makes them potential energy guzzlers and, thereby, large emitters of greenhouse gases (GHG). India is a prominent member of this club of emerging countries, and, in fact is, in absolute terms, the fifth largest GHG emitter in the world. Internationally, therefore, India is expected to reduce its energy-related GHG emissions. In any case, India being a primarily agricultural country, its vulnerability to climate change is disproportionate to its culpability. Balancing GHG emissions and economic growth is therefore not only an international obligation but also a daunting national challenge for India. In response to this challenge, India’s efforts are underway and the results so far are mixed – i.e., there are both successes and failures. In this context, this chapter reviews the climate change literature with a view to assess the past and the extant climate change mitigation policies in India and identify gaps in research geared towards guiding policymakers. In an attempt to partially fill this gap, the chapter sets three key objectives for the study : (i) to develop a database and a methodology to examine the impact of economic growth on GHG emissions, (ii) to delineate the factors governing the sectoral emission intensities, and, (iii) to formulate a climate-focused computable general equilibrium (CGE)model which can analyse \the efficacy of market-based policy instruments for climate change mitigation.