US ropes in India, China to bypass Kyoto pact

Though this is in keeping with the slew of announcements on cooperation with the US following PM Manmohan Singh’s visit, it remains to be seen whether India would actually benefit from any real technology transfer from the US. The danger is that India might just become party to an image-building exercise on part of the US, desperate to make up for bad publicity on the climate issue.

‘‘If it means actual technology transfer, it is useful but it should not undermine the Kyoto Protocol that has been agreed the world over as the mechanism to tackle climate change,’’ said R.K. Pachauri, chairman, United Nations’ Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change.

One of the main objections of the US to the Kyoto Protocol is that it does not have binding targets for India and China, the fastest growing economies. According to them, the protocol is fundamentally flawed if it excludes India and China which will be the largest producers of greenhouse gas emissions in the future. Two, the US says the Kyoto Protocol’s mandatory targets for reducing emissions by 2012 would be too harsh on their economy. They have been insisting that answers to the climate problem can be found in technology instead.

Under the new pact, the countries will focus on development of technologies that can cut emissions. The US has been keen on hydrogen as a replacement for fossil fuels. The other technology they have been pushing for is clean coal that gassifies coal before use to remove harmful carbon content.

A formal announcement of this partnership would be made at the summit meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations under way in Vientiane, Laos. Australia and South Korea which have not ratified Kyoto are also part of the pact.

With this announcement, it seems the US will have another excuse to not be part of the Kyoto mechanism. For India, it may be a win-win situation if US is serious about technology transfer to India to reduce carbon emissions.