Q&A: What does India’s new Paris Agreement pledge mean for climate action?
According to estimates from the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), India could hit the 60% target as early as 2028. India has set a new target to reduce its “emissions intensity” – greenhouse gas emissions per unit of economic output – to 47% below 2005 levels by 2035. The much-awaited announcement comes within India’s delayed new nationally determined contribution (NDC) for 2035 under the Paris Agreement, which had been due last year. The pledge, which has not yet been published by the UN, was approved by India’s cabinet and issued as a government press release on 25 March. The updated NDC from the world’s third-largest emitter lands amid the global energy crisis triggered by the Iran war, which has already led to Indians grappling with gas shortages. In its pledge, India has committed to non-fossil energy making up 60% of its installed electricity-generating capacity by 2035. The country has also announced an increase to its target for the amount of CO2 that will be absorbed by carbon sinks, such as forests – the first such rise since India made its first pledge to the Paris Agreement. Some climate experts in India have welcomed the new pledge, saying the country “is pulling more than its weight given its minimal historical contribution to emissions” and “despite recent geopolitical headwinds”. However, others point out that the targets “underestimate India’s potential” for clean-energy growth and “allow for an acceleration” of emissions, while “hiding” deforestation. Below, Carbon Brief outlines India’s new climate pledge for 2035 and its implications for the nation’s energy sector, emissions and adaptation efforts. This article will be updated once the full NDC has been formally published by the UN. What is in India’s updated climate pledge? What do India’s pledges mean for its energy sector? What do India’s pledges mean for its land sector? What are the political considerations behind India’s new climate pledge? How have India’s new pledges been received? What is in India’s updated climate pledge? The 1,200-word press release announcing the approval of India’s new NDC for 2035 is thin on detail. For example, it does not spell out any climate-finance needs for adaptation, mitigation or climate change-induced loss and damage. The details provided in the press release include three headline quantified targets for three areas: GDP emissions intensity “Non-fossil fuel” share of electricity generation Land and forestry First, India commits to cutting the “emissions intensity” of its GDP to 47% below 2005 levels by 2035, a small increase from the 45% target for 2030 set out in its previous pledge in 2022. Emissions intensity is defined as the total amount of greenhouse gas emitted for each unit of GDP, which means it applies to all sectors of the economy and covers all gases, such as methane and nitrous oxide, as well as carbon dioxide (CO2). However, there is no globally agreed benchmark to measure this type of target. According to the Indian government’s fourth “biennial update report” submitted to the UN on 30 December 2024, India had already reduced its emissions intensity by 36% between 2005 and 2020. By setting an intensity target, India would be able to continue increasing its emissions as its economy grows, as Carbon Brief has previously explained. This target, therefore, depends on the size of India’s economy in 2035, as well as its total emissions. (Under the terms of the Paris Agreement and the first “global stocktake” agreed in 2023, only developed countries are expected to set “absolute” targets to cut their emissions. Developing countries are “encouraged” to move towards such targets “over time”.) The two-point increase in India’s intensity target, to 47% by 2035, “will not bring any real emission reductions, given India’s fast-growing GDP”, says a statement from climate research group Climate Action Tracker. It says this new goal is ‘unlikely to drive significantly more ambitious action”. India’s GDP is expected to grow by an average 6.1% per year out to 2035, which is “more than any other major country or region”, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). Second, the country has pledged to raise the share of “non-fossil fuel-based energy resources in installed electric power capacity” to 60%. (India defines “non-fossil sources” as including large-scale hydropower, nuclear, bioenergy, solar and wind power.) The target is a 10-percentage point increase from the previous goal of “about 50%” by 2030. In July 2025, the Indian government announced that it had achieved this target, five years ahead of schedule. As of February 2026, non-fossil sources already made up 52.6% of installed capacity. The IEA estimates that India’s existing policies would be sufficient to achieve the newly targeted 60% share as early as 2030, reaching 70% by 2035. Third, the country has raised its land and forestry sector target for the first time since 2015. According to the press release description of the new pledge: “[India has] further enhanced the ambition of creating [a] carbon sink through forest and tree cover to 3.5-4.0bn tonnes of CO2-equivalent [GtCO2e] by 2035 from 2005 level[s].” However, the baseline from which India calculates its emissions reductions from forests was only clarified in 2024 and its metrics for measuring forest and tree cover remain controversial. (See: What does India’s pledge mean for its land sector?) Additionally, the target corresponds to a “business-as-usual scenario”, according to India’s own forest authorities, with no additional policies required to achieve it. Beyond the three quantitative headline goals, the NDC pledge also contains five qualitative targets. The government release says these are “intended to embed sustainability into everyday life and governance systems, promote climate-resilient development pathways and enable a just and inclusive transition for all sections of society”. They include a target to “mobilise domestic, and new and additional finance from developed countries”. Another qualitative target is a commitment to develop “resilient infrastructure” in order to “adapt to climate change in various sectors like agriculture, water resources, health, disaster management and fragile ecosystems”. The government release does not explicitly mention the 1.5C aspirational global warming limit agreed as part of the Paris Agreement, but it does “recogni[se] that climate change impacts are already being felt”. It also says the government has “placed strong emphasis on adaptation and disaster resilience across the key actors of its economy”. The release lists a range of adaptation actions and initiatives that the government is engaged in, from mangrove restoration to “heat action plans” and monitoring glacial lake outburst floods. However, it does not set any new adaptation goals. According to India’s national economic survey for 2025/26, adaptation and “resilience-related” domestic spending “surged” to 5.6% of the country’s GDP in 2022-23, from 3.7% in 2016-17, with 98% of adaptation finance sourced domestically. The Indian government says that the NDC “mark[s] a significant step towards the goal of achieving net-zero by 2070”, but does not offer further explanation. Additionally, it does not mention two targets announced by president Narendra Modi in 2021 at COP26 in Glasgow. These were to install 500 gigawatts (GW) of non-fossil capacity by 2030 and to reduce cumulative emissions between 2021-30 to 1bn tonnes of CO2 (GtCO2) below expected levels. However, the release does reiterate that the “achievement of our targets ahead of time…provides strong confidence in the country’s ability to deliver on future commitments”. The release also says that India has “considered” the outcomes of the first ”global stocktake” and the “need for greater ambition” in line with the Paris Agreement’s long-term temperature goal in “shaping” India’s 2035 NDC. It adds that, when formulating the pledge, the government took into account the principles of equity and common, but differentiated responsibility, as well as development and energy security priorities. What does India’s pledge mean for its energy sector? India’s new target for non-fossil sources to make up 60% of installed electricity generating capacity builds on its 2022 NDC target to reach “about 50%” by 2030. Although not specified in the latest release, the previous goal was said to have been conditional on the availability of low-cost international finance. In July 2025, India announced that it had already achieved this 50% target, five years ahead of schedule. When this announcement was made in June last year, India’s installed non-fossil capacity comprised 38.1% renewables, 10.2% of large hydropower and 1.8% nuclear energy. In January 2026, India’s non-fossil installed capacity reached 50.6% and, per the announcement, had already reached 52.6% in February. Meeting the new 2035 target would, therefore, require only another 8 percentage-point increase in the non-fossil share of installed capacity over the next nine years. This is much less ambitious than India’s own national generation adequacy plan, published in March 2026, which says that non-fossil fuel-based installed capacity would reach “70% of the total installed capacity by 2035-36”. According to estimates from the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), India could hit the 60% target as early as 2028. Beyond the overall non-fossil capacity target, the NDC release does not include specific goals for domestic renewable generation or capacity installation. According to the Central Electricity Authority, renewable energy, including large hydropower, only accounted for 22.4% of total electricity generation – a far lower share than the installed capacity percentage. As of January 2026, coal-fired power still accounted for 69% of total generation. India is still planning to add approximately 56GW of new coal-fired power generation capacity by 2030, because of the expected growth in peak electricity demand. According to a report by government thinktank Niti Aayog, India’s coal consumption for all uses “could more than double by mid-century before plunging sharply”. On the other hand, research for Carbon Brief by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) shows that electricity generation from coal in India fell by 3% year-on-year in 2025. It suggests that power-sector emissions could peak before 2030, if clean-energy capacity and electricity demand grow as expected. The analysis found that the fall in coal-fired power was partly a result of accelerated clean-energy growth, which played a significant role in driving down coal generation for the first time. Nevertheless, a range of challenges are holding back the growth of India’s grid-based solar power, according to a 2025 report by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA), which points to issues including delays in power supply agreements and transmission challenges. Solar manufacturing has seen a “13-fold jump” that has outpaced domestic demand. In September, it was reported that India had 44GW of renewable energy “ready for deployment”, but challenges around secure long-term power contracts were holding back its deployment. Experts tell Carbon Brief that off-grid solar might absorb some of this glut, which could explain additional outlays for rooftop solar in India’s February budget. In 2025, India added 7.1GW of rooftop solar capacity, a 122% increase from the previous year. However, Reuters reports that this rooftop solar push “is falling short of targets despite heavy subsidies” because of poor financing and limited support from state utilities and vendors. The country is expanding its hydropower fleet in the high eastern Himalayan region – near a disputed border with China – despite biodiversity concerns, drought and flood impacts on dams and reservoirs. According to Down To Earth, the country is also “prioritising pumped hydropower storage projects over battery systems”, expecting to add around 50GW of such capacity by 2032. India is also looking to nuclear energy to serve as a steady source of power to complement variable renewable output. In December 2025, the government enacted a landmark new nuclear law, dubbed the “Shanti” act – an acronym for “sustainable harnessing and advancement of nuclear energy for transforming India”. It aims to help India increase its nuclear capacity more than tenfold, from 8GW in 2024 to 100GW by 2047. (India has some 6GW of nuclear capacity under construction.) However, given high costs, extended timescales and India’s long history of public protests against nuclear energy over safety and land-acquisition concerns, it remains to be seen how quickly this capacity can be ramped up. What does India’s pledge mean for its land sector? For the first time since issuing its first target in 2015, India has raised its land and forestry carbon-sink goal in its updated NDC. This target aims to create an additional annual carbon sink of 3.5GtCO2e through “additional tree and forest cover” by 2035, compared with 2005 levels. This is a 1GCO2e increase from its target for 2030, which was to sequester 2.5-3GtCO2e through additional forest and tree cover by 2030. This time, India finally spells out a clear 2005 baseline from which these targets are to be measured. According to the Forest Survey of India’s (FSI) last India state of forest report, the country had “already reached 2.29Gt of additional carbon sink” against its 2005 baseline in 2023. Dr Sharad Lele, professor of environmental policy and governance at the Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment, tells Carbon Brief that the increase in India’s forest NDC target is “concerning” for several reasons. First among these, Lele says, is that the FSI’s official claim of sequestration so far “is based on shaky methods and non-transparent datasets”. He continues: “Second, the country continues to lose dense forests of high conservation and livelihood value to development projects while sequestration seems to be done through plantations. Third, and most important, carbon as well as conservation goals should not bypass the rights of Indigenous and local communities, [which] continues to result in both forest destruction and plantation happening in ways that disregard community concerns and priorities.”