Sri Lanka has officially submitted the updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Sri Lanka has updated the initially submitted NDCs under the Paris Agreement in 2016 with higher ambition level.
NDC is the building block of Paris Agreement, which was agreed in 2015 at the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) of UNFCCC. The Paris Agreement brought a new global climate change regime as it builds on a bottom-up approach allowing the countries to determine the priority climate actions nationally considering the national capabilities and capacities. Accordingly, the parties will progressively update the NDCs once in five years in a transformative pathway towards resilient and net-zero status by 2050.
The bottom-up and nationally driven approach is also expected to facilitate mainstreaming and integrating climate change priorities into development. Prior to the Paris Agreement, the parties were invited to submit their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) under the “Lima call for Climate Action” agreed at the COP20 of UNFCCC in 2014. It allows parties technically a less than a year to submit the INDCs with very little clarity and guidance of it. Sri Lanka, like many other countries, have submitted the INDCs and subsequent first NDC submission in a hurry. It hindered the potential integration and mainstreaming features of NDCs potentially affecting the level of ambition too.
Sri Lanka submitted its first NDC in 2016 under four main areas viz: climate change mitigation, adaptation, loss &damage and means of implementation. It sets a target of reducing GHG emission by 4% unconditionally and 16% conditionally in the energy sector and by 3% unconditionally and 7% conditionally in transport, industry, forests, and waste sectors altogether, by 2030 against the business-as-usual (BAU) trajectories. Energy sector mitigation targets have been detailed out under the first NDC submission largely based on the then Long-term Generation and Expansion Plan (LTGEP) of the monopolistic utility of Sri Lanka, the Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB). Those targets covered addition of renewable energy, demand side management and converting coal power plants to LNG. Transport, industries, waste management and forestry are the other sectors highlighted under the mitigation targets. Unlike the energy sector targets, these were more with qualitative targets and forestry sector showed only a coverage target of increasing the forest cover of the country from 29% to 32% by 2030 without a link to sequestration.
The updated GHG reduction target by 2030 for energy sector has been increased to 25% (5% unconditional and 20% conditional) from its previous target of 20% (4% unconditional and 16% conditional), with increased focus on demand side management, transmission and distribution efficiencies, R & D on new renewables. For the transport sector target is set to reduce 4% of BAU (1% unconditional and 3% conditional), where the proposed strategies more or less remain the same as that of the initial submission.
Updated NDCs has also introduced GHG reduction targets for industry sector; 7% of BAU (4% unconditional and 3% conditional), comparatively to other sectors, a promising target, mainly through fuel-switching, incentivising, setting up eco-industrial parks, and by employing circular economic principles etc. One of the most progressive GHG reduction targets appears in NDC-2020, is in waste sector. It is 8.5% unconditional and 2.5% conditional, a 11% reduction totally. Updated NDCs also includes a carbon sequestration capacity target for the forestry sector; 7% against BAU (2% unconditional and 5% conditional) through increasing of forest coverage. It is also worth to note the introduction of a new candidate for taking up GHG emission reduction challenge, the agriculture & Livestock sector. It is estimated through reduced post-harvest losses, increased crop productivity, and through introduction of renewable energy sources, the reduction will be 7% of BAU (4% unconditional and 3% conditional). Through the measures proposed in all sectors, overall GHG reduction target is 14.5% (4% unconditional and 10.5% conditional), an equivalent of 67,252 Gg of CO2.
The recent NDCs updated by Sri Lanka and submitted to UNFCCC has a higher-level ambition compared to the fist submission. The enhanced ambition is observed in the following aspects.
- Expanded sectoral targets such as including agriculture and livestock in mitigation actions.
- Increased ambition in existing targets such as energy sector
- Further specification of targets including addition of time frames, quantified emissions reduction and other outcomes such as in the transport sector
- Increased transparency in the development of targets with detailed sub-targets.
- Detail on the financing, monitoring and implementation of actions included in the NDC
However, it is clear that level of local integration and mainstreaming aspects have shown a clear impact through the updated NDCs. The ownership of the NDC targets have been clearly taken by the sector lead organizations in the process. The government also announced that the new NDCs will be linked with a “NDC Implementation Plan” and a “NDC Financing Strategy”. Those will positively reinforce the NDCs and the transitioning process of the country. It is important to see how the pandemic related impacts on the economy and overall financing ambitions of the developed countries will impact on this. The decisions on the UNFCCC COP26 to be held in Glasgow will have a close impact on successful implementation of the NDCs. While accepting that the updated NDCs are a leap towards Sri Lanka’s net carbon zero targets, it is important to pay attention to few factors to be negated and receive positive influence from, in the implementation of NDCs. Policy cohesiveness, financing options, technology and capacity gaps, and implication of governments actions in other sectors, international pressure are some of the surfacing such complexities and externalities.
Sri Lanka has made a steady progress in fulfilling the NDCs, while some recent policy changes drive the process yet there are some policies needs changes in order to fulfil the commitments while harnessing the economic, social and environmental benefits the CC context offers.