India, the world’s third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases, has been ramping up its use of renewable energy - but coal remains its dominant fuel for power production.
“India must end its reliance on polluting, financially volatile and costly fossil fuels,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a virtual address to the New Delhi-based environment think-tank The Energy and Resources Institute.
“Investing in fossil fuels means more deaths and illness and rising healthcare costs. It is, simply put, a human disaster and bad economics.”
He urged India to instead invest in solar power, which he said could tackle poverty by generating jobs at a time when the coronavirus pandemic has destroyed livelihoods and also boost access to energy for 64 million Indians who live without power.
“With the Covid-19 pandemic threatening to push many people back into poverty, such job creation is an opportunity that can’t be missed,” he said, adding that investment in renewable energy creates three times more jobs than fossil fuels.
Guterres called for a halt on commitments to new coal power after 2020, saying “the coal business is going up in smoke” as growing numbers of large investors abandon its use.
Neither the environment ministry nor the power ministry responded to repeated requests for comment.
India is the world’s biggest consumer of coal for power after China.
The coal ministry said on Tuesday that it plans to significantly reduce its coal imports in “the next few years” and boost local production to improve the economies of states in central India, where most coal mines are located.
The country’s coal demand this year has fallen after strict lockdowns hit the economy.
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