Long-Term Low Emissions Development Strategy envisions: 1. a transition from fossil fuels in a just, smooth, sustainable manner. 2. increased use of bio-fuels. 3. climate resistant urban development. 4. financing of sustainable development through Green Bonds. Select the answer using the code given below:
- (a)1 and 2 only
- (b)1, 2 and 3
- (c)2 and 4 only
- (d)1, 3 and 4
Correct — B, 1, 2 and 3. India's Long-Term Low Emission Development Strategy was handed to the UNFCCC at COP27 in November 2022 and is built around seven strategic transitions. Statement 1 is in the electricity chapter, which speaks of retraining people out of the fossil fuel sector so that the transition is just, smooth, sustainable and all-inclusive. Statement 2 is in the transport chapter, which carries the National Policy on Biofuels 2018 and its indicative 2025 target of 20 per cent ethanol blending in petrol, along with support for second-generation bioethanol plants. Statement 3 is a transition in its own right — adaptation in urban design, material and energy efficiency in buildings, and sustainable urbanisation — and the text talks explicitly about climate resilient urban design in growing agglomerations. Green bonds do appear in the finance chapter, but as one instrument among several for channelling private money, not as one of the strategy's stated transitions, and every option that includes statement 4 also drops one of the three that are plainly in.
- (a)1 and 2 only — Drops statement 3, yet sustainable and climate-resilient urban development is one of the seven named transitions of the strategy, with a chapter of its own.
- (c)2 and 4 only — Drops both the just-transition language of statement 1 and the urban transition of statement 3, which are the two most explicit items in the list.
- (d)1, 3 and 4 — Drops biofuels, although ethanol blending and second-generation bioethanol are among the most concrete measures the transport chapter carries.
A Long-Term Low Emission Development Strategy is the document a Party to the Paris Agreement files under Article 4.19 to show how it plans to get to mid-century. India filed its own at COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh in November 2022, alongside its net-zero-by-2070 pledge announced at Glasgow. It is organised as seven transitions: low-carbon electricity, an integrated low-carbon transport system, adaptation in urban design and buildings with sustainable urbanisation, economy-wide decoupling of growth from emissions, carbon-dioxide removal, enhancement of forest and vegetative cover, and the economic and financial aspects of low-carbon development.
The way through the item is to test each statement against the strategy's own chapter headings rather than against a general sense of what a climate document ought to say. Three of the four map straight onto chapters. Green bonds do occur in the document, so the item is not perfectly framed; but the four options force a choice, and only one of them keeps all three chapter-level items together. Note the paper's own spelling — it prints 'climate resistant urban development' where the strategy says climate resilient. The slip does not change what is being tested. Worth flagging: UPSC has not released a key for this paper, and several answer keys in circulation mark (a), counting only the fossil-fuel and biofuel lines. That reading has to leave out the urban transition, which the strategy names as a transition of its own, so this card takes (b).
- India submitted its Long-Term Low Emission Development Strategy to the UNFCCC at COP27, Sharm el-Sheikh, in November 2022.
- The strategy is structured as seven low-emission transitions, one of which is urban design, building efficiency and sustainable urbanisation.
- It carries the National Policy on Biofuels 2018 target of 20 per cent ethanol blending in petrol, indicated for 2025.
- India's declared net-zero year is 2070, announced at COP26 in Glasgow in 2021 as part of the Panchamrit commitments.
- The strategy's finance chapter names green bonds among the instruments for channelling private money into low-carbon investment; India issued its first sovereign green bonds in January 2023.
- Confusing India's net-zero year, 2070, with the global mid-century date used in most other strategies.
- Assuming a long-term strategy is only about energy supply and missing the urban, industrial and forestry transitions.
- Reading the paper's printed 'climate resistant' as a different idea from climate resilient.
As a select-the-statements item on what the long-term strategy contains, or as a single-answer question on India's net-zero year and the forum at which the strategy was filed.
No directly related past PYQ was found.
- practice — not a real PYQ
India submitted its Long-Term Low Emission Development Strategy to the UNFCCC at which Conference of the Parties?
- (a)COP25, Madrid
- (b)COP26, Glasgow
- (c)COP27, Sharm el-Sheikh
- (d)COP28, Dubai
Answer(c) COP27, Sharm el-Sheikh — India filed the strategy there in November 2022, a year after announcing its 2070 net-zero target at Glasgow.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The indicative target of 20 per cent ethanol blending in petrol was set by which policy?
- (a)National Policy on Biofuels 2018
- (b)National Auto Fuel Policy 2003
- (c)National Electricity Policy 2005
- (d)National Bio-Energy Mission 2022
Answer(a) National Policy on Biofuels 2018 — it set the indicative 20 per cent blending target, later advanced, and India's long-term climate strategy carries it forward.