Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Cost of climate change


A changed climate, with intense rainfall, severe droughts, extreme temperatures will require adaptation measures by countries that will entail significant costs. The World Bank initial study estimates the costs for developing countries "between 2010 and 2050 of adapting to an approximately 2 deg C warmer world by 2050 is in the range of $70 billion to $100 billion a year".
While the exercise is intense, inclusive of all scenario analysis, required measures and the related costs, I have made a feeble attempt at estimating the amount the Indian Govt. spends currently, on adapting to climate change. This comes to about USD 3 bn a year. Following figures (in Rs crs) of all activities:








Sunday, December 12, 2010

Some numbers and charts, analysis and review follows.

India is the third largest emitter of CO2 or equivalent gases. China the larges and USA second. The gap is incredibly large, China emissions amounted to over 6500 mil metric tonnes. USA 5800 MMT and India 1600 MMT in 2007!

India has one of the lowest per cap emission rates. More significantly, an improving energy efficiency, with the output produced per 1000 metric tonne of CO2 emission falling.