Confronting the climate change challenge: discussing the role of rural India under cumulative emission budget approach

Current global climate policy architecture does not aim at stabilizing the greenhouse gases concentration in the atmosphere that may achieve the proclaimed 2 degrees C guard rail. An alternative approach that targets on limiting the global cumulative emission to accomplish such an outcome is put forward by German Advisory Board of Global Change (WBGU). This research work further elaborates the approach and its flexibility instrument i.e. carbon trading. As the approach visualises sharing of the carbon budget (750Gt CO2) equally to every human being (2.7 t CO2 per capita), India is the country with largest tradable surplus reflecting its low emission per capita and large population. The research work further analyzes the emission profile of rural India and the significance of its future emission pathways within the proposed framework. It also shows how low carbon development in India can assist in cost effective decarbonization of industrialized countries and mitigation of climate change, given a global climate treaty based on the WBGU approach. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.