Carbon Capture and Sequestration: Implications and Opportunities for India

Abstract

At the COP-21 UNFCCC Summit, India has made a challenging and significant commitment (INDC) to the goal of confining global warming to no more than 1.5 °C. This is particularly remarkable because India’s economic growth trajectory requires a substantial increase in energy access to underpin the development and ensure the widespread benefits of such growth to all strata of society. At the same time, India depends significantly on fossil fuels imports and is projected to be primarily fossil-fuel-dependent for at least two decades going forward. This indicates that both demand-side interventions, i.e., improved energy efficiencies as well as reduced carbon-derived energy, and supply-side interventions involving greater use of renewable carbon energy and lower footprint of deployed non-renewable carbon energy are critical to achieving simultaneous targets of energy access, energy security, and GHG mitigation. In this chapter, an innovative approach to analyzing the implications of these elements at a level of carbon atoms in the supply chain, their energy conversion, implications on GHG emissions, and potential long-term strategies including carbon capture, sequestration, and utilization is presented.