Exogenous Promotion of Sustainable Electricity Policies in India: Opportunities and Challenges

Abstract

The Indian government needs to increase the access to electricity of a growing population and economy taking into account major environmental and health related challenges, rapidly changing technologies, social and cultural preferences and international commitments. Such an increased access calls for substantial investment, and hence India has been gradually liberalising the electricity sector since 1991. This paper addresses the question: What are the opportunities for accessing the foreign funding available to India and how can it use this funding to modernise its electricity sector in a sustainable manner? Based on a two year research programme, this paper examines the international institutional context and draws conclusions regarding the different mechanisms for India and the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats facing India. It argues that since foreign funding is flowing into the country with enhanced liberalisation, the climate change mechanisms should be used to steer electricity generation in a sustainable direction, and aid funds should be used to focus on access for the rural poor to energy.

Energy security in a developing world

“…25 Various climate change mechanisms (such as the Clean Development Mechanism and the Global Environmental Facility) and also other international funding mechanisms could possibly fund a part of these capital requirements. 13 Jamasb et al 22 reviewed econometric studies on the performance of these reforms in DCs. The reforms took many forms in different countries, some more and some less successful.…”

“…For example, the Indian industry and services sector has faced a major shortage in energy supply to meet the needs of its industrial sector and this has been a major incentive for increasing energy supply. 13 The other dimension is the access of the poor and marginalized to modern energy services. Currently, 2.6 billion people worldwide rely on traditional biomass such as dung, charcoal, or fuelwood as their primary source of energy, and it is estimated that 1.6 billion people lack access to electricity, the large majority of them in DCs.…”

“…2 While in the early days of the climate negotiations, the implicit contract between developed and developing as adopted into the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change was that the developed countries would reduce their rate of growth of emissions to make room for the economic growth and, hence, emissions of DCs-the leadership paradigm. 13 In 1986, the UN High Commission on Human Rights adopted the Declaration on the Right to Development (1986) a which recognized finally the right of the DCs to develop. However, by 1997, it became evident that reducing emissions in the USA would not be easy 30 and this ultimately led to USA's withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol in 2002.…”

“…This often translates into increased access for the industrial, services, and urban sectors. For example, the Indian industry and services sector has faced a major shortage in energy supply to meet the needs of its industrial sector and this has been a major incentive for increasing energy supply 13…”

Global energy efficiency governance in the context of climate politics

“…Most of these articles look at current policies and instruments in specific countries and how successful these have been and the potential for future policy. There are also many articles examining how international instruments may affect policies including energy policies in developing countries (e.g., Taylor et al 2008;Fink and Cramer 2008;Scheumann 2008;Gupta et al 2007). However, there are, relatively speaking, much fewer articles (Marauhn 2003;Goldthau and Witte 2008;Goldthau 2008), policy papers (Schrumm 2006), and presentations (Westphal 2005) on global energy governance.…”