As Obama and Modi Meet, 4 Opportunities for US-India Action on Clean Energy and Climate

The briefing outlines the unique energy context of India—characterized by high total emissions but low per capita emissions—and proposes four areas for US-India cooperation: facilitating investment in renewable energy, leading a global clean energy collaborative, expanding climate resilience partnerships through data access, and establishing direct high-level communication to support the 2015 Paris climate agreement.

• India is the world's third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases, yet its per capita emissions of approximately 2 tons are significantly lower than those of China (8 tons) and the United States (20 tons). Additionally, India's cumulative emissions since 1990 represent only 4 percent of the global total, compared to 14 percent for China and 16 percent for the United States.
• The Indian government has set an ambitious target to increase solar power capacity to 100 gigawatts (GW) by 2022, which is 30 times the level at the time of writing and five times the previous renewable energy target. Furthermore, the government aims to provide 24-hour electricity to all citizens by 2019 and has initiated a project to create "100 smart cities" to improve urban development.
• The document proposes four specific actions for US-India cooperation: 1) developing a commercial strategy to increase US investment in India's renewable energy targets and resolve solar panel trade issues; 2) leading a global clean energy collaborative to foster research and technology access, such as battery storage; 3) launching a major initiative for universal access to climate impact data and information; and 4) establishing a direct high-level communication line to facilitate the December 2015 Paris climate agreement negotiations.

APA

World Resources Institute (2015). As Obama and Modi Meet, 4 Opportunities for US-India Action on Clean Energy and Climate. https://www.wri.org/insights/obama-and-modi-meet-4-opportunities-us-india-action-clean-energy-and-climate

Chicago

World Resources Institute. As Obama and Modi Meet, 4 Opportunities for US-India Action on Clean Energy and Climate. 2015. https://www.wri.org/insights/obama-and-modi-meet-4-opportunities-us-india-action-clean-energy-and-climate.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=World Resources Institute |title=As Obama and Modi Meet, 4 Opportunities for US-India Action on Clean Energy and Climate |date=21 January 2015 |url=https://www.wri.org/insights/obama-and-modi-meet-4-opportunities-us-india-action-clean-energy-and-climate |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{worldresourcesinstitute2015obama, author = {{World Resources Institute}}, title = {{As Obama and Modi Meet, 4 Opportunities for US-India Action on Clean Energy and Climate}}, institution = {World Resources Institute}, year = {2015}, month = jan, url = {https://www.wri.org/insights/obama-and-modi-meet-4-opportunities-us-india-action-clean-energy-and-climate}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }