 Now the International Relations Capsule for the Shankar Prayers Academy. Today our topic is COP26. I'm sure you're all familiar with this short form for conference of parties. Conference of parties to what? To the Framework Convention on Climate Change which was adopted in 1992 in Rio de Janeiro. So since that time there have been 26 Cops, this is the 26th conference of parties over all these years. But it has not reached any conclusion regarding an action plan to meet the problem of climate change. The 1992 agreement was a dream agreement because developed countries accepted that they have a special responsibility and they undertook mandatory reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. And developing countries since they are emissions for the development were allowed to continue with restraint. But that lasted only for a short while. By the time the first conference of parties was held in Berlin in 1995, we had already moved away from the consensus in Rio de Janeiro. I was the vice president of the COP1 and also the spokesperson for the G77 that is the developing countries in Berlin. So I saw with my own eyes how the developed countries were moving away slowly and steadily away from their commitments. And their argument was that there were any developing countries like China, Brazil, India, etc. also had to accept mandatory cuts, which we fought this very hard in Berlin and we managed to come away without any mandatory cuts, which led to the Kyoto Protocol which continued the principles of Rio de Janeiro in the sense that there are separate responsibilities for developed countries and developing countries. But then the Kyoto Protocol was rejected by the major developed countries. So the first stage of climate change action came to an end when climate Kyoto Protocol failed to take off. So people started looking for alternatives. People means mostly developed countries, they wanted to escape their responsibilities. So what others have to carry on, we have to join in because if we don't further discuss then nothing will happen. Climate will get worse, the world will go to disaster. So everybody put their heads together and major leaders, including India in 2007 and Copenhagen decided to change the track because the track of mandatory cuts were developed and no cuts for developing countries would not work. And therefore this new idea of voluntary cuts by everybody evolved. And there we have a new action plan, climate action plan we adopted and which was formalized in 2015 in Paris. So that was the second, shall we say, 2.0 action plan. The 1.0 was Rio de Janeiro, now 2.0 was in Paris. And there the idea was everybody would declare what they are willing to cut voluntarily but with a view to make sure that the overall global temperature does not go beyond 1.5 degrees Celsius, that was the objective. But all the voluntary cuts announced and all the pledges were made but nothing happened because there were other elements, not simply pledges. There are also elements like technology transfer and financial contributions. So without technology transfer and financial contributions, nothing was happening. About 100 billion dollars were promised in Paris. Much of it nobody has seen. Some climate money is being put here and there but not in the hands of the developing countries which need it. So with the collapse of the Paris arrangement, another search is on. Particularly after President Biden took over and went back to the Paris agreement and he said that we need to find a new formula. So it is this new formula that is being now developed in Glasgow, in Ireland, the 26th COP. And what I had seen in COP1 has not changed much in COP26. That is the point I am trying to make. Because most of the problems that we handled and fought in Berlin and succeeded, they still remain and there is no solution. So the new formula is that no voluntary cuts, no talk about cuts or grand boughs or emissions, etc. But every country must move towards declaring a net zero emission year. So the Americans said they are willing to move towards a net zero emission by 2030 and they asked everybody else regardless whether you are a developed country or a developing country to move towards a year when your greenhouse emissions will be net zero. In the sense that not that you will not have greenhouse gas emissions but whatever excess emissions that you have will have to be absorbed in what are called the things that is the forest, the water and so reduce emissions but if there are emissions those should be controlled by developing things where they are absorbed and therefore Americans said okay by 2030 we can reach that and then they said to everybody now you declare your years and without any talk about finance or technology. So it is the same thing again, the finance and technology should have not been resolved. Nobody knows how it will go about, who will declare what year but some declarations were made, Europeans mostly 2050, China said 2060 and India has finally after having said that we cannot get any given a day like that without commitment of finance and technology we will not be able to do that. That is what the environment minister said before our prime minister left for Glasgow and before that of course in Rome also there was a meeting. In Rome they did not agree on a year, they said we must all try to find a year towards the middle of the century. That means everybody was talking in terms of 2050, 2060 and India finally was a Narendra prime minister, Narendra Modi himself made the declaration in Glasgow that India would move towards a net zero emission year in 2070. So what is the result of all this? When we declared this became big news all around the world, people said India had made a major decision. Not only that we said that 2070 we will reduce, we will reach a nuclear, I mean sorry, net zero carbon emission year. He also said that we will take a number of steps in the year 2030. So we have now commitments in 2030, four of them and there is one commitment for 2070. So then impression has been created around the world that India is being very constructive nice against China or Russia. China and Russia did not even go to the conference and they are pretending that there is no such problem but everybody else is very concerned as to what will happen to the environment. So many people have declared various steps and India has declared four, in fact five commitments, four of which we are supposed to accomplish by 2030 and the fifth by 2070. Let us look at this. One is increasing non-fossil fuel capacity to 500 gigawatts. So to avoid the use of fuel pole etc, we will develop non-fossil fuel capacity. It could be wind, it could be nuclear, it could be solar, it could be anything else. So we will develop capacity high which means we will reduce our emissions. We don't say that but this is one promise we have made. Second promise we have made is 50% of energy requirements of India will be met by renewable sources. So whatever the figure is, I'm not looking at the figure but what the Prime Minister said that by 2030, 50% of our energy requirements will be from renewable sources and the third that India will reduce carbon emissions by 1 billion tons a year. All these sound very impressive. So 1 billion tons a year we will reduce our carbon emissions and then falls, reduce the carbon intensity of the economy by 45%. It is not reducing emissions but the intensity of carbon in the economic development of India will be reduced by 45%. And finally the big announcement that we will go up to 2070. And this has made an impact on the people because at least on part of India there is a commitment. But what they are not reading is the fine print because the economic or minister for environment has clarified after the Prime Minister made all these announcements saying that Prime Minister also said 1 trillion US dollars would be paid to the developing countries. These dollars we have been hearing about since Rio de Janeiro. There it was 356 billion dollars as it was mentioned and when it came to Paris it became 100 million dollars a year. And now our Prime Minister said none of these will do. Give us 1 trillion dollars to the developing countries and then we will fulfill it. So in other words what he's saying is that these four promises for 2030 will be subject to the availability of money and technology. So in other words we are back to square one. And this is a situation with most other countries. So people say the International Energy Agency is saying that all these added together, all these net zero declarations are all added together. The best expectation of the result of the consequences of all these will be by 2100, 80 years from now, the temperature will be 1.8 degrees Celsius. So what is the use? If you go above 1.5 degrees Celsius even by 1 degree or 1.2 degrees, you are already underwater. The water is above your nose level. Once you are above nose level it doesn't matter how much more water you have on top of your head. So the result of all that Glasgow is planning. If they are all implemented including India's 2030 plans, India's 2070 plans, China's 2060 plans, America's plans and everybody else Australia, everybody has declared some year of the year. But when it is added up all together, the happiest situation is 1.8 degrees Celsius. So even before the conference ended, the conference is ending only on the 12th of November, you know, always this environment conference are huge festivals. NGOs come with all kinds of demand. There's a lot of show people walking around in the streets. It's a celebration. On the one hand, the developed countries holding on to their position. And all these NGOs from developed countries, developed countries, everybody is roaming around. They cannot go into the conference, but they have their procards, they have their shows, they do dancing on the street. So it is continuing. The heads of governments have left, but the festivities are going on and the final declaration etc will only come by the 12th of November. But now we know what the results are. So the results are going to be that we will still have 1.8 degrees Celsius global warming by 2100 and so it is bad news. But then the only consolation is that everyone is determined to do something on his own. So international cooperation was considered very important and we have been trying to frame laws for international cooperation. But having failed to frame these laws and countries like China, which is the worst polluter, is keeping away from all this, there is very little hope. But India's position has always been, we will do, we know the problem. We will do, this is what I said in Berlin as the leader of the Indian elevation. We know there is a crisis, there is a problem. We will fight it with our own capacity back home. Don't ask us what we are doing. But it cannot be done. The problem cannot be solved without the polluters paying for their mistakes, what Mrs. Indira Gandhi said in 1972 in Sweden. And that is the same thing that we are saying even today. We have the will, we have the ability but to have environment-friendly trade, environment-friendly economic development, you need the new technology we don't have. We don't have the kind of money that you need. And if you spend the money on that, our economic development will not proceed. And therefore, the situation remains the same. What we were saying in 95, we are saying even today. But what is new is that determination on the part of the countries to do whatever is possible to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. And also if there is greenhouse emissions and also try to control it. So try to control or neutralize greenhouse gas emissions means you need to have more forests. You need to have more water bodies, less pollution of the atmosphere. And that is essential for carbon dioxide to be absorbed by natural possessions. And for that, you have a biodiversity convention that we are supposed to encourage biodiversity. Allow growths of forests, allow animals to grow, allow water bodies to be created etc. But there was a biodiversity convention in Kunming a few weeks ago and no new decisions was taken there. So unless you link the biodiversity convention to the climate change convention, there is no way that you can find the sinks for the carbon emission. So today, what COP is dealing with are the same issues though in a in different ways. In fact, what we are doing is slightly worse than Paris Agreement because in Paris Agreement there was measurable cuts. People saying we were cut so much, so it was measurable. But now people are saying that this such and such a year we will be carbon free. Who is convinced by it? So in a way, I feel personally that what we are doing for Glasgow for unrealistic targets for net emissions will not really make any difference. The agreement in Rio that developed countries have a special responsibility and developing countries need to develop that principle, common but differentiated responsibilities is now disappearing because everyone is being told you declare a year. And we have declared our year and we have made it very clear that this will work only if the conditions are net. So the Prime Minister has declared it, but subsequently the Environment Minister has said that they are going to give it in writing that unless that $1 trillion is available, they are talking about $100 million a year. But our Prime Minister is talking about $1 trillion. So we will do everything possible to reduce our emission, but if you want to have big changes, we need big money. And there is no doubt about that and we should be very clear about it. Then there are other countries doing other small things. Like for example, 20 countries have got together and they have said that they will not encourage development of fossil fuel exploitation. But there's not a lot of fossil fuels available in different parts of the world. And if you make very heavy investments, you can take them out. Like in Siberia for example, immense amount of fuel is available there. But very expensive exploitation, very expensive action is required. So 20 countries who normally finance fossil fuel projects has declared in Glasgow that they will not do it. This is a new development, not very good from our point of view, not very good from oil exporting countries point of view because they are looking for investments. Similarly on coal. Coal is supposed to be the biggest villain in climate change. And coal is the most important resource for India. So we are not willing to accept any kind of reduction. We have said that the percentage will change in the sense that we will use more nuclear energy, more renewable energy, etc. But we are silent when it comes to coal. But some countries, 46 countries have signed a declaration that they will not encourage coal use of coal. And they will not invest in coal related businesses anywhere in the world. So emissions cannot be achieved unless they reduce emissions and also remove some from the atmosphere. Unless you can get that. And so the coal initiative is an interesting one. But China will not join us, join it, India will not join it, even US has not joined it. So it is more of a symbolic commitment. So we can wait for the final conclusion to see how all these things are presented at the end. Maybe it will be presented as a great victory because this is a US initiative. And the country which is being let off is China. China is now the biggest amateur, higher than the United States. And we are much smaller than China. But we are end up making these deterioration while Xi Jinping is happily sitting in Beijing, hoping that he'll become president for life. That is more important for him than the Glasgow conference. And President Putin also has not bothered to come there. There seems to be some kind of coordination there. So the individual efforts will continue. There is a certain amount of reasonableness and certain of sincerity is available. But as usual, the NGOs, people who are studying objectively are saying, this is all blah, blah, blah, nothing else. Those are the words used by our friend Thunberg, Greta Thunberg, the young leader of the environment movement in the world. So she said there is nothing new in Glasgow. This is the same blah, blah, blah. And the Italian Prime Minister, because this meeting took place, the G20 meeting took place in Tilly just before this. And the Italian Prime Minister, after the end of the G20 meeting, said it was not all blah, blah. At least he also considered that it was not all blah, blah, not all blah, blah, he said. And he said, my expectations are not buried and I hope things will be better in Glasgow. So here is the situation. As far as my own understanding is concerned, we are nowhere away from the disaster that is confronting the world. All these good will talk, conversations, praising each other, talking about the sun. Like Prime Minister Modi said, one sun, one world, one grid. And that's what the British Prime Minister said, and only one Modi. So that made a big impact. And Mr. Modi has now emerged as a global leader in reducing emissions. So that way we have gained something. Mr. Modi has got a leadership role. He was seen embracing the Pope and putting hands around the UN Secretary General and hugging the UK Prime Minister. So there's a lot of bond homing. People seem to have forgotten about the pandemic, fair enough. But the net result will be the same that IPCC keeps saying that there is disaster coming. It is just close by. Maybe you have 200 years, nothing more. Well, what is the answer? Answer is technology. I think that if we are able to do all this, we should also be able to capture the carbon in the atmosphere and bury it somewhere. That kind of technology has to come. Maybe it is there somewhere, maybe expensive, maybe it's a secret. But I don't see any country in this world developed or developing, allowing their development to be reduced, cut down by saving the environment. Because poor people need fuel. Someone said when the child is crying for food, and if you tell the mother, don't cut the branch of the tree to cook your dinner, because you will be spoiling the environment. Would she care about it? For her, the hunger of the child is more important. So like Prime Minister Mrs Gandhi said in 1972, poverty is the worst for you. Remove poverty, change your lifestyle developing developed countries. Why do you need four cars for every family? Why do you need 17 air conditioners in every household? India has only 7% of the households in India have air conditioners. So what is that disparity? Therefore, they have to cut their lifestyles, change their lifestyle, Prime Minister repeated it again. Find the money, resources for developing countries to develop. And then only these problems can be solved unless the only hope is a technology that will destroy the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and we will be rid of this dangerous phenomenon. So that is my personal assessment of COP26 and I don't see it any different from COP1 where I was in 1995. The problems still remain. Thank you very much. No political will. Even the so-called 44 million that we are talking about is nebulas. You cannot say where it has been spent. In the budget of these countries, they say we did this, we did that. Maybe they have done something in Costa Rica for their own reasons or they may have done something, but it's not coordinated. So the expenditure which is being spent under that head is not coordinated. And so nobody can verify it. It's unverifiable. No, because we have made it very clear this is subject to other conditions. It's not an unconditional. 2030, we are saying clearly unless you get my $1 trillion, we are not going to do anything like that. And the minister said that it's going to be entered into the official records. 2070 is more open and everybody knows that 2070 is far away and what will happen till then we don't know. So India's position as the leader of the world. In fact, in G20, the developing countries manifesto was prepared and presented by India just as I did this back in 1995 in Berlin. I was the spokesperson of G77. I wrote that paper and presented it to the G77 and submitted it to the COP1. It's the same thing. The story continues. That is a sad part of it. No, philosophically you can say that because you have a target and suppose we are able to fulfill it, because finding alternatives is a good news. If somebody says, okay, you lock up your poll, we will give you money to run your economy. We'll be very happy. So we are not interested in pollution. We are interested in development. And therefore in a philosophical way, we can say that we are moving in the right direction like 20 countries saying that they will not support fuel exploitation or 46 countries saying that they will not use coal. So these are good signs, but they don't immediately give us any benefit. So that's why I said the difference between COP1 and COP26 is that individual action has been given more prominence. And collective action is receded. Yes, that is one of our policies right from the beginning. In Rio onwards, we have been favour of a forestry convention. And India is certainly committed to increase on our forest power. But there again, when there is poverty, as I said, we cannot stop people from cutting the trees. And that is a existential requirement for India. And therefore, while we do that, we want to plant at least entries when we cut one. And that policy remains, but it's being cut without anybody knowing about it. The forest cover is reducing. So we could not have made any commitment like that. It's true that forest cover increasing is a good prospect. And what we are saying is, when you say we will reduce our dependence on fossil fuel and conventional energy, what we are meaning is all this. We will not cut trees. We will not pollute our water resources. It's all covered. Hydro power is in any case not polluting. If you can have hydro power in place of all the other resources, well, we know how. It is not a greenhouse gas emitting. Or if you can manage to develop your nuclear power. But as you know, after the accident in Fukushima, nuclear power has become less fashionable. And people considered dangerous. India was dreaming of 7% of our energy requirements being met by nuclear power when we signed the nuclear deal with the United States. It is now reduced to 2%. It used to be 3%. So the whole thing collapsed. And also because of our own wrong decision to suggest the liability compensation law, by making that liability compensation liability act, we have stopped foreign countries from coming to India for nuclear work. So we do not have a single foreign reactor India, except the good old Russian one. All others are stopped. And therefore, how can we develop? So we have been a champion of nuclear energy and we have been pushing it in different conferences. And of course, the world, many countries who are averse to nuclear is not willing to accept this as an automatic country like Germany or Austria. Many countries are allergic, Japan. And so we could not push it. So what they said, they accepted it as a part of the nuclear, part of the energy mix. And that has been accepted. Well, why are so many things in different phases? Nuclear implosion is supposed to be a great invention. You know, no, explosion is required. As going on, the research is going on in Paris. We all joined trying to find out whether you can have nuclear energy without explosion that's going on. Hydel energy is going on. All these include need a lot of investment. And another thing I discovered following what is happening in Glasgow is that it is fair enough to say develop alternate sources of energy. But storing those resources, those alternate sources of energy is a highly expensive process. You have to create batteries. See cold need not be put in batteries. It can be stored. But if you create energy out of any other source, it has to be stored in batteries, which is a major expense. And that is not being added to all our calculations. So one day, let us see whether we'll get tidal energy also. And even our own nuclear programs, we have this three stage nuclear program, but we have gone beyond the second stage. And others are doing various other things. And even Microsoft is trying to make small reactors, and they'll come into the market. And then our uranium project, sorry, thorium project is, we don't hear anything about it. Dr. Abdul Talam kept saying another five years, another 10 years, because he was a dreamer. But it is still a dream. Thorium has not reached a stage where it can be used for energy. And we have in Kerala any amount of thorium ore available. But it is still not being used for nuclear energy production. And that would be a breakthrough. So we are all looking for breakthroughs. So you may have noticed in the front, there is a panel in front of the lectern, the speakers sitting in the class, which says breakthroughs. Everybody is announcing breakthroughs. But the real breakthrough hasn't come yet. But isn't it obvious? We don't want to undertake a commitment. That is the difference. We are not against forest conservation. We are not wanting to cut out all the trees. We are not like Bolsonaro, who is allowing all of the forest to be burnt in Brazil. Such crazy things we don't do. Even in the United States, a lot of forest is being burnt. Why? We don't know. But so we are not against it. We are for it. We have declared many times that we want these things to save the world from target. But to give a commitment, just as we have not given a commitment on coal, we have not given a commitment on fossil fuel. And these are things that we cannot do without, for the time being, these are for survival emissions. So similarly, for us to give a commitment that increase forest oil. And this has been happening right from the beginning. Even in Rio, they tried to push a forestry convention on us. And that was not considered practical. For a country of India's size and India's poverty, that's what you have to note. This is a food cooking facility for land communities everywhere in India. You cannot stop them from cutting the trees. So that is the politics of it. And we will come to that when we are in a better situation. Thank you very much. See you again next week.