Iran Press/ Europe: India will meet a target of net zero emissions by 2070, the country’s prime minister has told the Cop26 global climate summit.
Speaking at the world leaders’ summit at the UN conference in Glasgow, Narendra Modi made five key pledges for how India would decarbonize over the next few decades. India, a developing country of more than 1.3 billion people, is the world’s third-largest emitter of carbon dioxide after the US and China.
India was one of the last remaining major economies that had held out on a net-zero commitment, despite months of pressure from the US, and Modi’s announcement marked one of the most significant moments of the summit’s opening day.
Only last week, India, currently the world's third-biggest emitter of greenhouse gases after China and the United States, rejected calls to announce a net zero carbon emissions target.
The United States, Britain and the European Union have set a target date of 2050 to reach net zero, by which point they will only emit an amount of greenhouse gases that can be absorbed by forests, crops, soils and nascent "carbon capture technology".
Scientists say the world needs to halve global emissions by 2030 and reach net zero by 2050 to avoid the worst impacts of climate change.
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