Tag: India

Poster Child for Green Energy Becomes Buyer of Emergency Power

The road out of my hometown in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu runs between rows of wind turbines. For most of my life I treated them as scenery, admiring them as a technical marvel.

Danish engineers helped install the state’s first 110 turbines between 1985 and 1992, and the Muppandal cluster in Kanyakumari district grew into India’s largest onshore wind farm at 1.5 gigawatts.

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From The CO2 Coalition

By Vijay Jayaraj

The road out of my hometown in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu runs between rows of wind turbines. For most of my life I treated them as scenery, admiring them as a technical marvel.

Danish engineers helped install the state’s first 110 turbines between 1985 and 1992, and the Muppandal cluster in Kanyakumari district grew into India’s largest onshore wind farm at 1.5 gigawatts. By 2012, wind was delivering up to 35% of the state’s electricity for days at a stretch, a share that industry observers said only Denmark had matched.

In 2017, a friend who ran a factory told me how erratic swings in electricity supply had caused damage and lost orders, wiping out months of profits. He linked the problem to the surging and fading of wind power on the grid. That was a warning. Nine years later, the entire state is experiencing the same grid failures at a far higher cost.

Poster child no more

Few Indian states received as much international praise for its renewable energy as Tamil Nadu. In 2018, the World Economic Forum recognized the state for generating more wind power than Sweden or Denmark, the Scandinavian countries that climate activists hold up as models.

Wind accounted for more than 28% of Tamil Nadu’s installed generating capacity, well ahead of Gujarat’s 19%. Today, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka lead India in wind installations, with Gujarat and Tamil Nadu alone holding nearly half the national total.

Now look at what that reputation buys in October 2026.

Tamil Nadu has signed the costliest power purchase deals in the country to keep the lights on during evening hours. The state confirmed it will buy 1,500 megawatts for six peak hours every day from October 15 to 31, mostly from natural gas plants at a cost of about $527,000 a day. Those emergency rates run six to seven times higher than an existing contract for thermal power and nearly double the rate being paid by a neighboring state.

Where the electricity went

Officials blame a heatwave for the need to buy additional power. Peak demand jumped nearly 30%, driven by El Niño conditions that kept air conditioners and fans running long after the usual summer peak. Central generating stations also cut back on generation to accommodate scheduled maintenance.

But the real culprit is a drop in wind production to about 14% of what contracts had promised. Nobody should be surprised. The wind season in Tamil Nadu ends every year around this time. Solar output drops to zero after sunset, which explains why the shortage is between 6 p.m. and midnight. Hydropower, a weather-bound source that depends on reservoir levels and monsoon inflows, offered no meaningful rescue.

Consider who filled the gap. Every bidder in the emergency tender was a gas-fired generator, some of them in Assam 1,400 miles away. Gas won because it starts and stops on command. The state that spent three decades celebrating wind turbines now pays a premium for the one quality they cannot offer – on-demand dispatchability.

Tamil Nadu is India’s second-largest state economy, with a quarter of its output coming from manufacturing, which requires an affordable, continuous supply of electricity.

This month, in Tiruppur, Tamil Nadu’s fourth-largest city, knitwear factories reported production losses as computerized machines failed under sudden outages and low voltage. They suffered the same damage my friend had described nine years ago. Spinning mills near Madurai were told to switch to diesel generators, whose electricity costs significantly more than the grid’s.

Tamil Nadu’s planners must stop relating to installed wind capacity as if it were a reliable source. A turbine that produces at 14% of its contracted level during peak demand cannot support a power grid for many millions of people. India’s second-largest economy needs an energy supply based on coal, natural gas, and nuclear.

Originally published at The Washignton Times, October 28th, 2026.

Vijay Jayaraj is a Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Fairfax, Virginia. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India. He served as a research associate with the Changing Oceans Research Unit at University of British Columbia, Canada.

India Rejects UN Climate Politics in Favor of Industrialization

India’s External Affairs Minister, Dr. Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, used the U.N. General Assembly gathering to say something that climate scaremongers like Al Gore and John Kerry have spent three decades excluding from the conversation: “Energy security is at the heart of development. Availability and prices should not be manipulated for political ends.”

An illustration depicting India's commitment to energy industrialization, featuring a prominent figure holding the Indian flag amidst scenes of industrial growth, climate discussions, and various energy sources like coal and solar. Text highlights include key themes of energy security, economic growth, and job opportunities.
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CO2 Coalition

By Vijay Jayaraj

India’s External Affairs Minister, Dr. Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, used the U.N. General Assembly gathering to say something that climate scaremongers like Al Gore and John Kerry have spent three decades excluding from the conversation: “Energy security is at the heart of development. Availability and prices should not be manipulated for political ends.”

The developing world, he said, needs “fair economic and trade practices which enhance our production capabilities and do not reduce us to mere consumers. Our right to industrialize must not be denied.”

Dr. Jaishankar’s statement is a rebuke to climate campaigners who once envisioned India as the poster child of the “green” transition, the manipulators of energy “for political ends.” Those would be the anti-fossil fuel governments that themselves grew rich on coal, oil, and natural gas and now demand that others pursue their own prosperity with inferior energy sources like wind and solar.

The minister knows that a nation without the capability to make steel, cement, fertilizer, and electronics stays a buyer of other people’s goods. That is the future of “mere consumers” that he refuses to accept on behalf of India and the rest of the Global South.

What makes this moment interesting is that India’s actions presaged Dr. Jaishankar’s words. New Delhi has spent years reciting net-zero talking points at climate conferences while quietly building one of the most aggressive expansions of fossil fuel use on the planet.

India achieved 1 billion metric tons of coal production for the first time in 2024-25, with thermal plants supplying more than 70% of the country’s power.

India also turned to the United States to lock in supplies of oil and natural gas, a move I described as a manifestation of energy sovereignty in the India-U.S. deal. Coal for the grid, oil for transport, and gas for fertilizer and industry. That is the energy mix of a country that intends to grow.

In April, the most telling decision to date came when New Delhi quietly withdrew its bid to host the U.N.’s annual climate summit in 2028, citing a “review of its commitments.” Its net-zero target of 2070 already was the most distant deadline of any major economy.

Though India has made progress in tackling poverty, its per capita income remains a fraction of G7 nations whose diplomats lecture climate dogma and expect India’s rural families to wait decades for grid-scale batteries so that a European bureaucrat can announce a climate milestone. That is the outrageous bargain publicly rejected by the subcontinent.

India’s louder voice did not emerge in a vacuum. The current American administration has created more space for public discussion about the economic consequences of aggressive climate mandates. This matters because Washington still shapes global finance, energy diplomacy, and institutional priorities.

When America treats oil, gas, coal, nuclear power and domestic energy production as strategic assets rather than embarrassments, developing countries are better positioned to resist pressure from globalist bureaucracies. Washington’s pro-energy, pro-growth posture empowers India to speak plainly.

Jaishankar made his argument in the context of the “Global South,” and that framing matters. Hundreds of millions of people in sub-Saharan Africa still live without electricity. Many African governments sit on vast gas and coal reserves they are expected to leave in the ground. India, with its economic weight and diplomatic reach, can say what smaller nations fear to utter at the negotiating table.

The climate movement has built its moral authority on the claim that it speaks for the world’s poor. India has dismantled that assertion on the U.N.’s own stage. The poor, it turns out, want electricity that works, fuel they can afford, and jobs in factories that run on something more dependable than good intentions.

Originally published at PJ Media, October 2nd, 2026.

Vijay Jayaraj is a Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Fairfax, Virginia. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India. He served as a research associate with the Changing Oceans Research Unit at University of British Columbia, Canada.

Coal remains the undisputed king of global power generation

The loss of LNG supplies through the Strait of Hormuz drove up gas prices in Europe and Asia massively.

As a result, coal generation is now expected to rise slightly (~1.4%) in 2026 rather than fall, while gas-fired output stays roughly flat

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This claim holds based on the latest IEA figures and the Oilprice.com article (Charles Kennedy, August 19, 2026).

According to the IEA’s Electricity Mid-Year Update 2026 (which the article draws on), coal-fired generation is forecast at 10,974 TWh in 2026—nearly one-third of global electricity production (total around 33,313 TWh).

That makes coal the single largest source by a wide margin:

  • Natural gas: ~6,976 TWh
  • Hydropower: ~4,536 TWh
  • Solar: ~3,289 TWh
  • Wind: ~2,898 TWh
  • Nuclear: ~2,871 TWh

Coal is expected to generate nearly as much as gas and hydro combined and about 77% more than wind and solar combined.

All renewables collectively (hydro, solar, wind, bioenergy, geothermal and other) are set to overtake coal for the first time in 2026 (renewables ~11,627 TWh).

No individual renewable source comes close to coal, however.

The IEA still projects coal to remain the largest single source through at least 2030, even as its share gradually declines and total renewable output grows faster (roughly 8% plus in 2026).

The IEA had earlier expected a modest decline in coal generation for 2026.

Higher natural-gas prices, linked to disruptions in LNG supplies through the Strait of Hormuz amid the ongoing conflict involving Iran, have made coal more competitive for fuel-switching in parts of Asia and Europe.

The loss of LNG supplies through the Strait of Hormuz drove up gas prices in Europe and Asia massively.

As a result, coal generation is now expected to rise slightly (~1.4%) in 2026 rather than fall, while gas-fired output stays roughly flat.

China (still generating more than half of the world’s coal power) and India remain the dominant drivers.

Rapid renewable build-out is meeting a large share of new demand growth, but absolute coal output stays very high because overall electricity demand is rising strongly (IEA forecasts ~3.6% global demand growth in 2026).

In short: wind and solar continue their record expansion, and the broader renewable category is overtaking coal this year.

Yet coal’s absolute scale and dispatchable role keep it the clear leader among individual sources for the foreseeable near term.

China is the world’s largest coal consumer, accounting for more than half of global demand (roughly 4.9–5.0 billion tonnes in recent years).

Its coal use shapes global markets. Demand has been roughly flat in 2025 and is expected to be stable-to-slightly higher in 2026, with a likely peak and slow decline later in the decade.

Power Generation (Dominant Driver: ~60–70% of Total Coal Use)

This is by far the largest and most dynamic segment.

  • Strong electricity demand growth remains the core structural driver. China’s power demand is growing ~5–5.5% in 2026 (after ~5% in 2025), driven by:
    • Industrial activity and manufacturing (still the biggest slice of demand).
    • Residential and commercial cooling (air conditioning surges during heatwaves; El Niño is amplifying this in 2026).
    • Electrification trends: electric vehicles, data centers/AI, and some process heat.
  • Renewables are growing extremely fast (record solar and wind additions), and coal’s share of generation has fallen (below 50% in H1 2026 for the first time). However, absolute coal-fired generation can still rise when demand outpaces clean supply, wind resources are weak, curtailment is high, or hydro underperforms.
  • In 2025, coal power generation declined modestly (~1–1.5%) for the first time in a decade because renewables, hydro and nuclear covered nearly all demand growth. In 2026 it is rebounding (estimates of +1.5–3%), partly due to weaker wind conditions, higher curtailment of renewables, and reduced gas-fired generation amid elevated LNG prices linked to Middle East disruptions.
  • Coal plants increasingly serve as flexible capacity for peak demand and grid stability rather than pure baseload, supported by new capacity additions (tens of GW still coming online) and long-term power contracts that reserve significant generation for coal.

Industrial Demand (Non-Power: ~30–40%)

Trends here are mixed and partially offsetting:

  • Steel (metallurgical/coking coal) — Soft-to-declining. Real estate weakness and slower infrastructure growth have reduced pig iron and crude steel output. Gradual shifts toward electric arc furnaces (scrap-based) also reduce coking coal needs over time.
  • Cement and building materials — Clear structural decline. Cement production has been falling for years due to the property market correction and maturing urbanization.
  • Coal-to-chemicals — Strong growth and a key offsetting factor. China is expanding coal-to-olefins, coal-to-methanol, fertilizers, and other chemicals. This supports energy security by substituting domestic coal for imported oil and gas feedstocks. It has helped keep overall industrial coal demand relatively stable even as steel and cement weaken.

Other Drivers

  • Energy security and policy — Coal is viewed as the most reliable domestic fuel. The ongoing Middle East conflict and LNG supply risks have reinforced this preference. Official policy aims for a coal consumption peak before 2030 under the “dual carbon” goals but prioritizes security and allows new flexible coal capacity. The latest five-year plan for coal emphasizes controlled development rather than rapid phase-down.
  • Weather and seasonal factors — Extreme heat or cold, drought (affecting hydro), or poor wind conditions quickly increase coal burn for power and heating.
  • Domestic supply dynamics — China produces the vast majority of the coal it consumes. Safety inspections (e.g., in Shanxi) can temporarily tighten supply and affect prices/imports, but overall production capacity remains ample.

Summary Outlook

DriverDirection (2025–2026)Relative ImportanceNotes
Electricity demandStrong growthVery HighIndustry + cooling + electrification
Renewables expansionVery strongHigh (offsets coal)Share falling, but absolute coal can still rise
Coal-to-chemicalsGrowingMedium-HighKey industrial offset
Steel & cementDecliningMediumStructural (property market)
Energy security / policySupportive of coalHighReinforced by geopolitics
WeatherVariable (heat/wind/hydro)Medium (short-term)Can swing annual numbers

Rising electricity demand is the primary force keeping Chinese coal demand high.

Rapid renewable growth is reducing coal’s share and limiting absolute growth, but has not yet produced sustained large declines in volume because of the sheer scale of new power needs, intermittency challenges, and the strategic role of coal for reliability and chemicals.

Most analysts expect Chinese coal demand to plateau near current levels and begin a gradual decline later this decade, though the exact timing depends on electricity demand growth, renewable integration success, and industrial restructuring.

Indonesia and India Are Jointly Planning a Hydrocarbon-Powered Future

Both countries are moving deeper into manufacturing, and both must serve an upwardly mobile middle class.

That means more electricity, more refined fuels, more petrochemicals, more steel, more freight, and more industrial heat. It also means more coal, oil, gas, and nuclear power – energy sources that can deliver reliable, affordable power.

The CO2 Coalition

By Vijay Jayaraj

A millennium ago, India’s Chola Kingdom commanded the seas of Southeast Asia, forming with the Indonesian archipelago deep mercantile and cultural roots and a shared economic destiny that lasted for hundreds of years. In the 21st century, these two giants are again engaging in complementary roles on the global stage.

India is the world’s most populous nation, and Indonesia the fourth. Together, they represent 1.8 billion people intent on basic survival, industrial growth, and ascending the global economic ladder.

Both countries are moving deeper into manufacturing, and both must serve an upwardly mobile middle class. That means more electricity, more refined fuels, more petrochemicals, more steel, more freight, and more industrial heat. It also means more coal, oil, gas, and nuclear power – energy sources that can deliver reliable, affordable power.

The need for fossil fuels took center stage when Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto met in Jakarta to forge deeper economic ties July 7. At the top of their agenda sat a massive expansion of energy trade and an Indian request for more Indonesian coal to feed a ravenous power grid.

This is a logical arrangement in a fast-growing industrial relationship. Bilateral trade has grown more than fivefold since 2005, from less than $5 billion to nearly $25 billion. India remains Indonesia’s second-largest buyer of coal and the biggest importer of Indonesian crude palm oil, while also sourcing minerals, rubber, hydrocarbons, pulp, and paper. In return, India supplies refined petroleum products, vehicles, telecom equipment, steel products, and agricultural goods.

The Steel Authority of India and Indonesia’s Krakatau Steel just agreed to a joint venture for making stainless steel in Indonesia. Around 90% of India’s primary steel output still depends on coal. Indonesia’s steel industry is similarly coal-dependent, with almost 80% of production relying on the fuel.

Indonesian Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Bahlil Lahadalia reported that India has expressed interest in participating in Indonesia’s oil and gas sector. Once one of the largest producers of gas in the world, Indonesia recently awarded multiple exploration contracts to international oil firms.

The two governments discussed cooperating on peaceful nuclear projects. Like fossil fuels, nuclear power offers dependable baseload electricity that the intermittent sources of solar and wind cannot match.

Both sides also signed multiple agreements on critical minerals and supply chain technology, medical product regulation, disaster management, telecommunications, and agriculture.

Rejecting Green Dogma, Tackling Energy Poverty

Recent rolling blackouts in Sumatra and Java exposed severe vulnerabilities in the national electricity system. State utility PLN openly admitted that constrained coal supplies were responsible for Java’s crippling outages. It is impossible to grow a manufacturing hub on solar and wind, which are subject to the whims of weather.

Faced with the catastrophe of energy starvation, Indonesia is rejecting green propaganda. Jakarta delayed its timeline for retiring coal-fired power plants. In December 2025, the government quietly but firmly abandoned plans to close the Cirebon-1 plant.

India finds itself in the same boat and makes equally rational choices. Coal continues to generate nearly 80% of the country’s power. When severe weather devastated hydroelectric facilities across the subcontinent this year, India turned to coal as a substitute. India’s heavy reliance on coal is projected to continue well beyond 2047.

In a declaration of energy sovereignty, India withdrew a bid to host the 2028 United Nations climate summit. No amount of U.N.-inspired fearmongering will deter the mission to secure affordable energy for the Indian populace.

The India-Indonesia trade relationship is dismissing the apocalyptic fantasy of the climate industrial complex and committing to secure the energy sources that people need to improve their lives.

Originally published at The Hill, August 11, 2026.

Vijay Jayaraj is a Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Fairfax, Virginia. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India. He served as a research associate with the Changing Oceans Research Unit at University of British Columbia, Canada.

India Faces $6.5 Trillion Financing Gap for $22.7 Trillion Net-Zero Transition by 2070

India quietly withdrew its bid to host COP33 (the 2028 UN climate conference) and has highlighted the massive costs of its net-zero pathway, including continued coal growth.

India quietly withdrew its bid to host COP33 (the 2028 UN climate conference) and has highlighted the massive costs of its net-zero pathway, including continued coal growth.

In early April 2026, India informed the UNFCCC Asia-Pacific Group that it was withdrawing its candidacy “following a review of its commitments for the year 2028.”

The government later confirmed this via the Ministry of External Affairs, noting “several issues” were considered while reaffirming commitment to its climate responsibilities and Paris Agreement targets.

It has been one of the G20 countries meeting its existing Paris commitments and continues its broader green agenda. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had proposed hosting at COP28 in Dubai in 2023; the bid had BRICS support and internal planning (including a dedicated cell).

No detailed public explanation was given beyond the review of 2028 commitments. Possible factors cited in reporting include logistical/political calendars (near national elections), declining perceived relevance or trust in recent COP processes, and prioritization of domestic needs.

This is separate from (but thematically linked to) a February 2026 NITI Aayog roadmap, Scenarios Towards ‘Viksit Bharat’ and Net Zero.

Key points from the reports:

  • Achieving developed-economy status by 2047 (Viksit Bharat) alongside net-zero emissions by 2070 requires cumulative investment of about $22.7 trillion (roughly $500 billion annually on average). Power accounts for over half. About $8 trillion needs to be front-loaded by 2050.
  • At least ~$6–6.5 trillion of the total is expected to need external sources; a financing gap remains even after projected domestic mobilization (~$16.2 trillion).
  • India’s coal consumption is projected to continue rising until 2047 (while energy intensity falls and efficiency rises), even on pathways consistent with the 2070 net-zero goal. Non-fossil power generation share rises substantially (to 65–80% by 2050 depending on scenario, higher later). The strategy emphasizes electrification, clean electricity, demand control (e.g., Mission LiFE), circularity/efficiency, and cheaper external finance.

The NITI work is a government-led multi-sectoral modeling exercise covering power, transport, industry, buildings, agriculture, finance, critical minerals, R&D, and social implications. It frames the transition as compatible with strong growth (GDP toward ~$30 trillion by 2047 in the scenarios) but capital-intensive, with many needed technologies not yet mature or requiring large upfront outlays.

Commentators interpret the COP33 step-back in different ways: some as pragmatic prioritization of development and energy security for a large emerging economy still expanding energy access; others as a signal of frustration with unmet developed-country finance/tech commitments, politicization of COPs, or reduced enthusiasm for hosting the process.

India continues to engage on climate issues, submit NDCs, expand renewables, and push equity/finance demands in negotiations, while expanding domestic coal and securing hydrocarbons as transitional measures.

Hosting decisions rotate by regional groups; South Korea has been mentioned as a possible alternative contender for 2028.

India’s $22.7 trillion figure refers to the cumulative investment required for its net-zero pathway by 2070, not the financing gap itself.

The actual financing gap identified by NITI Aayog is approximately $6.5 trillion.

The study Scenarios Towards Viksit Bharat and Net Zero (especially Financing Needs Vol. 9) models two main pathways:

MetricAmount (USD)Notes
Total investment needed (Net Zero Scenario)$22.7 trillionCumulative 2026–2070
Current Policy Scenario~$14.7 trillionContinuation of existing trends
Incremental cost of Net Zero$8.1 trillionExtra needed beyond current policies
Mobilizable capital (with reforms)$16.2 trillionDomestic + projected foreign inflows
Financing gap$6.5–6.53 trillionDifference between need and mobilizable funds
Annual average requirement~$500 billionvs. ~$135 billion total investment in 2024 (only $70–80 bn clean energy)
Front-loaded needs by 2050~$8 trillionIncluding ~$5 trillion in power

Power accounts for roughly half of total needs (~$12.3 trillion in detailed breakdowns) and 82% of the financing gap. Industry (~$6.1 trillion total needs) and transport follow. The gap widens after 2050 as harder-to-abate technologies (green hydrogen, CCUS, long-duration storage, etc.) scale up.

External sources would need to rise from ~17% of capital today to about 42% by 2070 to close the gap. Concessional finance and grants are flagged as especially critical for immature technologies.

Nature and Drivers of the Gap

  • Scale is unprecedented: Current clean-energy investment levels would need to roughly triple or more and stay elevated for decades.
  • Capital intensity: Renewables, transmission, storage, and later industrial decarbonization require large upfront outlays before returns materialize.
  • Domestic constraints: Risk of crowding out other investment, higher interest rates, limited depth of corporate bond markets, and the need to financialize more household savings without disrupting growth.
  • Technology maturity stages: Mature options (solar/wind) need scale-up capital; mid-stage (storage, EVs) need blended/concessional finance; frontier (hydrogen, CCUS) need grants and de-risking.
  • Growth compatibility: The reports argue the transition can support a ~$30 trillion economy by 2047 (Viksit Bharat) with limited long-term GDP impact if external finance is available (deviation as low as ~0.5% in foreign-financed scenarios vs. higher if purely domestic).

Closing even the $6.5 trillion gap is difficult. Global climate finance remains far below what developing countries need overall, and developed countries have repeatedly under-delivered on earlier pledges. India would require sustained large-scale inflows of FDI, portfolio investment, concessional loans, and grants—while managing currency, debt, and geopolitical risks.

Domestic reforms proposed include:

  • Creating a National Green Finance Institution to aggregate projects, provide guarantees, and crowd in private capital.
  • Deepening corporate bond markets and green taxonomies.
  • Enabling institutional investors and better financializing savings.
  • Stage-sensitive financing strategies tailored to technology readiness.

Without sufficient external capital, the pathway becomes harder: either slower progress toward net zero, higher domestic costs that could pressure growth or public finances, or greater reliance on transitional fuels (consistent with the report’s projection that coal use continues rising until around 2047).

The $22.7 trillion is the full price tag of the dual goals (developed economy + net zero).

The real binding constraint is the ~$6.5 trillion gap that domestic resources alone are unlikely to fill.

This underscores India’s long-standing emphasis on equity, technology transfer, and scaled-up international climate finance—while it continues expanding energy access and industrial capacity.

The numbers highlight why the transition is framed as a “delicate balancing act” rather than a straightforward decarbonization race.

India To Climate Cartel: Count Us Out

Sometimes a story gets buried not because editors conspire against it, but because the news cycle has room for only one crisis at a time.

And that is the story of India’s explicit rejection of the global net zero movement.

From CO2 Coalition

By Vijay Jayaraj

Sometimes a story gets buried not because editors conspire against it, but because the news cycle has room for only one crisis at a time. This year the big news has been the Iran war. But even accounting for competing headlines, the silence around a genuinely consequential development is telling.

And that is the story of India’s explicit rejection of the global net zero movement. India has walked away from its bid to host the COP33 UN climate conference, and the world’s climate press has treated it as a footnote rather than the signal it is.

India had spent years projecting a rising voice in the development of climate policy, and hosting a COP33 is the closest thing the bureaucracy has to a coronation. Then, quietly, without public explanation, India withdrew its offer. No press conference. No elaboration. Just a government stepping back from a role for which it auditioned for years.

The truth is India has run the numbers on the cost of a net zero energy transition for a population of 1.4 billion climbing out of poverty, and it does not like what it sees. The notion that India should shackle its economy by adhering to restrictive climate policies, while its people still grapple with energy deficits, is illogical and morally indefensible.

Data India Doesn’t Need a Summit to See

Furthermore, the narrative of a rapidly degrading Indian environment due to energy consumption is demonstrably false. India’s own environmental indicators do not support the apocalyptic framing of the climate obsessed.

For years, hydrologists and climate modelers have relied on Himalayan snowfall estimates to forecast water availability for hundreds of millions of people across South Asia’s most fertile Ganges plains. Their projections of a seriously drier India, it turns out, were wrong.

A team of researchers, including scientists from the British Antarctic Survey, the U.K. Met Office, and Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, used frozen high-altitude lakes as natural pressure sensors rather than relying on undersized conventional rain gauges. What they found was startling: In a single winter, the best available snowfall models had underestimated seasonal snow over the Lake Hampta area of Himachal Pradesh by 37%. The peer-reviewed study makes clear that conventional instruments have been missing large volumes of snow for decades.

Then there is the vegetation story, which cuts even harder against the doom narrative. Researchers at the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology modeled how India’s landscape would respond to a high-emissions future using the same family of computer models climate activists cite when warning of catastrophe.

The result was not desertification. It was the opposite. Gross primary production, a measure of how much carbon dioxide India’s forests, croplands, and other vegetation are absorbing, rose from roughly 729 grams of carbon per square meter annually in 1985 to about 830 by 2014 and is projected to nearly double to around 1,305 by the year 2100.

Layered onto that are the steady expansion of India’s forest cover over the past two decades and the recovering populations of endangered species such as tigers and Asiatic lions, successes resulting from conservation and habitat management rather than from decarbonization mandates.

All this means India has stopped outsourcing its environmental judgment to a U.N. process that treats every barrel of oil and every ton of coal as a moral affront, regardless of its benefit in lighting a clinic for children or powering a steel plant that employs thousands. A country that still has hundreds of millions of citizens without reliable access to electricity does not have the luxury of treating energy poverty as an acceptable trade-off for leadership in the climate industrial complex.

That is why India has expanded coal production and struck oil and gas deals with the United States and Persian Gulf producers. It has resisted binding emissions targets that would cap its own industrial growth, unwilling to commit to far-off targets for emission reductions. India’s relinquishment of COP33 hosting rights is perhaps the most visible expression of a strategic direction that has been building for years.

A country that the entire architecture of climate financing is supposedly built to help just declined to host the party. If climate summits worked as advertised, that would be unthinkable. But it is no longer, and pretending otherwise will not make the next withdrawal any less predictable.

Originally published at American Greatness, August 1, 2026.

Vijay Jayaraj is a Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Fairfax, Virginia. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India. He served as a research associate with the Changing Oceans Research Unit at University of British Columbia, Canada.

Energy Security and Climate Realism Usher in Coal’s Rise

Coal demand remains robust globally despite renewable growth and net-zero ambitions.

While headlines often emphasize a coal phase-out, data through 2025–2026 shows demand holding near record levels, driven by energy security priorities, economic growth in Asia, and pragmatic recognition that intermittent renewables cannot yet fully replace reliable, dispatchable power.

From The CO2 Coalition

By Vijay Jayaraj

Much of the global energy conversation still pretends that coal is on its way out. The pretense may be comforting to activists, investors, and policymakers who built their plans for a transition to so-called clean energy that never acknowledged the limitations of solar and wind power. However, the newest work by Lars Schernikau and Portia Roberts, The Coal Reality That Western Policy Ignores, shows the opposite: Coal is not being replaced, but rather being layered on top of everything else.

The data reveal that global coal consumption is accelerating. The appetite for reliable, baseload power drove usage to an unprecedented high of approximately 9 billion tons in 2025.

This volume represents more coal mined and burned than at any time in history, far outstripping levels recorded before the multi-trillion-dollar Western net-zero campaign. In 2025, China alone brought on-line 80 gigawatts of new coal-fired generation – enough to power 60 million households.

The Iran war’s disruption to supplies of liquefied natural gas has further boosted demand for coal as nations switched fuels for electricity production. This strategic imperative drove a massive surge in coal shipments across the Pacific. Bangladesh, Japan, the Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan, and Vietnam immediately increased coal imports to avoid blackouts, with China and India leading the shift.

While alternative energy installations have expanded, coal utilization has grown right alongside them. The two asset classes are not locked in a zero-sum game but are growing to meet a voracious demand for electricity and industrial production.

The world’s proven reserves of coal – deposits that can be extracted economically utilizing current technologies – possess an operational runway of 130 to 150 years at today’s consumption rates. Taking into account remaining geological reserves, Earth holds enough anthracite and bituminous coal for many hundreds of years.

Schernikau and Roberts also remind readers that coal sits at the center of food security. Roughly a quarter of the world depends on fertilizers made with coal-derived ammonia. Abandon coal too quickly and you risk not only blackouts but also food production and, ultimately, lives.

This return to dependable solid fuels coincides with a long-overdue collapse of the pseudoscientific architecture that sustained for decades the narrative of a fabricated climate crisis. For years, scenarios of extreme weather based on flawed climate models were systematically weaponized by activist bureaucrats to demand the dismantling of a hydrocarbon economy.

The most prominent of these fabrications was Representative Concentration Pathway 8.5 (RCP 8.5), alongside its companion RCP 7.0. The international modeling consensus has formally abandoned these deceptions, confirming that RCP 8.5 is officially “implausible.” The apocalyptic scenarios used to terrorize the public and coerce financial markets were never rooted in real-world data.

The institutional framework designed to starve conventional energy sectors of investment capital is unraveling before our eyes. The corporate campaign for Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) compliance has had a severe global retrenchment. Global investment consortia, led by institutional giants like BlackRock, have quietly dismantled or significantly downgraded strict climate mandates. International banking groups and global aviation associations have canceled or rolled back aggressive net-zero timelines.

The fantasy of a rapid, painless transition away from hydrocarbons has run headfirst into physical laws and geopolitical necessities. Weather-dependent power technologies cannot run steel mills, operate heavy manufacturing, or secure domestic food supplies. The climate establishment can keep writing obituaries for coal, but the market keeps resurrecting it because there is no substitute for its scale, reliability, and availability.

Stop pretending that every rise in renewables implies a fall in coal. Stop using extreme scenarios to frighten the public into accepting policy mandates that do not fit the needs of growing economies. And stop telling developing nations that they must sacrifice dependable power in the name of predictive models that no longer command trust.

Originally published at PJ Media, July 15th, 2026.

Vijay Jayaraj is a Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Fairfax, Virginia. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India. He served as a research associate with the Changing Oceans Research Unit at University of British Columbia, Canada.

The Real Competition Behind the U.S Coal Revival

What struck me most was not the debate about coal.

It was the curiosity.

From Watts Up With That?

By Michelle Manook

Three years ago, during one of my first roadshows across the U.S., I met with senators, congressional representatives and policy advisers from both sides of the aisle on Capitol Hill.

What struck me most was not the debate about coal.

It was the curiosity.

There was a genuine appetite to understand what was happening in China and India, the world’s two largest coal-consuming economies and among its fastest-growing industrial powers. Many policymakers understood the U.S.’s domestic energy challenges. Fewer had a clear picture of how other nations were approaching them.

Those conversations have stayed with me because China and India were already asking a different question.

While much of the West debated which fuels should be phased out, they concentrated on securing the affordable, reliable energy needed to grow their economies and strengthen their competitive position.

They understood something simple. Energy security is national security, and affordable energy underpins competitiveness.

Looking back, it should not surprise anyone that the U.S. is now investing heavily in coal. The real question is what took so long?

The last five years have been a reminder of why energy security matters. COVID exposed the fragility of global supply chains. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the collapse of Russian gas supplies into Europe triggered the largest energy shock in decades. More recently, disruption in and around the Strait of Hormuz demonstrated how quickly energy markets can be thrown into turmoil.

Each crisis reinforced the same lesson. Reliable, affordable energy underpins economic resilience.

Now the U.S. faces a new challenge.

Artificial intelligence is driving the strongest growth in electricity demand seen in a generation. According to the International Energy Agency, a typical hyperscale data centre consumes around 100 megawatts of electricity, enough to power approximately 100,000 homes. Meta’s proposed Hyperion project in Louisiana is expected to require at least 5 gigawatts of electricity, roughly three times the power demand of the entire city of New Orleans.

AI may be driving today’s headlines, but this conversation is much bigger than AI.

Reliable and affordable electricity underpins manufacturing, industry, jobs, investment, living standards and economic opportunity. Countries do not compete on climate targets. They compete on productivity. And productivity depends on energy.

That reality helps explain why Washington has committed more than US$1.3 billion over the past year towards coal-fired power generation, grid reliability, supply chains and technology development.

These investments are often portrayed as support for ageing coal plants. That misses the point.

The average U.S. coal plant is nearly 50 years old. Most operate on technology developed in the 1970s and 1980s, achieving thermal efficiencies of 33 per cent. The objective is not to preserve ageing infrastructure; it is to modernise it.

The Administration’s recent US$850 million investment is focused on extending plant life, improving efficiency, strengthening reliability and advancing new coal projects in Alaska and West Virginia using advanced technologies.

The U.S. has already demonstrated what modern coal technology can achieve.

The John W. Turk Jr. power station in Arkansas, commissioned in 2013, remains the country’s only ultra-supercritical coal plant. Compared with a conventional coal plant, it consumes less fuel, avoids approximately 320,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions annually and reduces sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, mercury and particulate emissions.

Yet while the U.S. largely stopped building advanced coal facilities, other countries continued innovating.

That is why China and India matter, not because the U.S. should copy them, but because it should learn from them.

China’s newest ultra-supercritical coal plants operate at thermal efficiencies exceeding 47 per cent. The country is deploying carbon capture at scale and converting coal into fuels, chemicals, hydrogen and industrial feedstocks. India is investing billions in coal gasification to strengthen energy security and create higher-value industrial products from domestic resources.

These are not simply energy projects. They are competitiveness projects.

The technologies improving efficiency and reducing emissions are also strengthening manufacturing, creating new industries, reducing dependence on imports and generating greater economic value from coal.

This principle sits at the heart of FutureCoal’s Sustainable Coal Stewardship (SCS) framework, which promotes proven technologies that make coal cleaner, more efficient and more valuable, from high-efficiency power generation and carbon management to coal-to-products technologies and new industrial applications.

The Global South never took its eye off the ball.

While many Western economies became consumed by debates over which energy sources should disappear, countries across Asia remained focused on a more fundamental question; how to secure the affordable, reliable energy needed to grow.

The U.S. now appears to be returning to that conversation.

The question is not whether coal remains part of the energy system. It is how the U.S. builds the reliable, affordable and secure energy system needed to support AI, strengthen industry and compete in an increasingly energy-intensive world.

AI may have accelerated the debate.

Competitiveness will determine the outcome.

Michelle Manook is Chief Executive Officer of FutureCoal, the global organisation representing the coal value chain. She works with governments, policymakers, investors and industry leaders across North America, Asia, Africa and Australia on issues relating to energy security, industrial development and coal innovation. Recognised by Mining Journal as one of the 50 most influential people in global mining for the past four consecutive years, Michelle is a regular commentator on global energy policy, with articles published in The Australian,Australian Financial Review, Financial Times, and Sunday Times in South Africa.

This article was originally published by RealClearEnergy and made available via RealClearWire.

India Should Abandon Its Ethanol Illusion

Instability in the Middle East has disrupted oil and gas flows to India. However, India’s proposed plan to produce 30% ethanol-blended gasoline and diesel as a response to supply anxiety would be a costly error. To understand the pending disaster, you only need look to the United States.

From CO2 Coalition

By Vijay Jayaraj

Instability in the Middle East has disrupted oil and gas flows to India. However, India’s proposed plan to produce 30% ethanol-blended gasoline and diesel as a response to supply anxiety would be a costly error. To understand the pending disaster, you only need look to the United States.

Failed American corn-ethanol

For decades, the American government heavily subsidized and mandated corn ethanol in motor fuels. The National Center for Energy Analytics recently published a comprehensive autopsy of this experiment. The findings are devastating.

Washington’s aggressive push for biofuels destroyed millions of acres of pristine land. Farmers, incentivized by government, plowed under native grasslands, drained wetlands, and converted fallow conservation acreage into intensive cultivation. Land was diverted from feeding people to filling fuel tanks.

Moreover, the supposedly harmful greenhouse gas emissions that ethanol use was to reduce instead are shown to increase when the entire lifecycle of land use and production inputs is taken into account. And the promised energy independence? A mirage. Americans paid for environmental destruction and higher food bills to benefit the pockets of the politically connected, all while exporting their high-quality fuels.

Bigger failure awaits Indian sugarcane ethanol

If the American corn ethanol experiment was a failure, Indian ethanol made from sugarcane will be a catastrophe.

Sugarcane requires lots of water, consuming over a long growing season up to two-thirds of a gallon per plant—more than double amount required to grow the corn that American production uses.

In terms of fuel extraction, the water requirement of ethanol from Brazilian sugarcane is 647 gallons of water for every single gallon of ethanol produced. In the United States, that number climbs to 733 gallons. In India, the demand is even greater—791 gallons.

India already faces a severe water deficiency. When the monsoons fail to produce sufficient seasonal rains for the crucial Indus and Ganges river basins, harvests suffer and cities ration drinking water. Mandated increases of sugarcane production for fuel can only exacerbate water shortages. Switching from sugarcane to rice, corn, or wheat to meet ethanol quotas offers no relief from greater water demands.

The ultimate metric for analyzing any energy source is the comparison of how much energy is produced to the amount of energy required to produce it. Ethanol’s score is abysmal compared to gasoline and diesel, which are distilled from energy-dense crude oil.

Agricultural production is energy intensive, requiring tractors, irrigation pumps, the manufacture of artificial fertilizers, and the distilling of alcohol. By the time ethanol is pumped into a fuel tank, the output of the process may even fall short of the inputs.

“Producing one gallon of ethanol may well take more energy than the end product contains,” according to the Texas Public Policy Institute. “With fertilizer, water, an energy-intense fermentation process, and transportation necessarily by rail or truck instead of existing pipeline, ethanol production utilizes much more energy than crude oil to reach the pump.”

Free India from climate chains

All that extra work to produce ethanol increases the emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases that climate alarmists insist are so dangerous, making the charade of this biofuel even more ridiculous.

Besides, we know that there is no impending climate crisis. In July 2025, the U.S. Department of Energy released an analysis of the effects of greenhouse gas emissions, confirming that there isno existential threat from the weather.

Far from being a pollutant, CO2 at higher levels in the atmosphere delivers massive benefits to humanity. CO2 is plant food. Satellite data confirm India’s forests are expanding. Its agricultural production is breaking records. The enriched atmosphere allows crops to utilize water better and yield more food.

India cannot afford to play games with the energy needs of 1.4 billion people to climb the economic ladder. If the Middle East can no longer supply Indian needs, retreating into the dark ages of burning biomass is not the answer.

Instead of pouring billions into government mandates, India should drastically increase purchases of American natural gas to bypass the geopolitical instability of the Middle East. The U.S. possesses vast reserves of this energy–dense fuel to power industry, make fertilizers that sustain crop yields, and reliably generate electricity.

It is time to abandon the ethanol illusion and secure the energy India needs to thrive.

Originally published at PJ Media, June 10, 2026.

Vijay Jayaraj is a Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Fairfax, Virginia. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India. He served as a research associate with the Changing Oceans Research Unit at University of British Columbia, Canada.

India’s Record Crops Reject Food, Warming Alarmism

A claim that repeatedly clashes with observable reality demands scrutiny. Such claims survive only when contradictory evidence is buried, data selectively presented, or fear trumps fact. Such is the case with the apocalyptic narrative of climate change.

From CO2 Coalition

By Vijay Jayaraj

A claim that repeatedly clashes with observable reality demands scrutiny. Such claims survive only when contradictory evidence is buried, data selectively presented, or fear trumps fact. Such is the case with the apocalyptic narrative of climate change.

One among the many pretenses of doomsayers is that shifting climate patterns threaten global food security. Environmental websites like Mongabay warn that “climate change, extreme weather, and conflict exacerbate the global food crisis,” as if harvests are failing everywhere. “Science” blogs declare that climate change endangers food systems. The United Nations states that “the world’s food supply is made insecure by climate change.”

If this drumbeat matched reality, heavily populated agrarian nations would be showing signs of collapse, with my home country of India already a cautionary tale. Hundreds of millions of Indians still depend directly or indirectly on agriculture. Rainfall variability has shaped its economic history for generations.

Instead, India’s crop production has shattered records year after year, proving this thread of climate dogma false.

India’s agricultural miracle defies climate propaganda

India ranks as the world’s second-largest producer of rice and wheat, with output reaching 150 million and 117 million metric tons, respectively, in 2024-25. The country achieved record food grain production of 358 million metric tons, reflecting a strong shift towards high-value crops. Between 2020 and 2025, agricultural exports rose 50% to $51 billion. Agriculture and allied activities account for nearly one-fifth of the country’s gross value-added at current prices, employ approximately 46% of the workforce, and support nearly 55% of the population.

Does this look like a collapsing ecosystem to you? Do record-breaking harvests reflect a planet hostile to plant life? The shrieks of climate Chicken Littles are no match for millions of tons of harvested grain.

The toxic CO2 myth
How does a nation in the tropics, supposedly vulnerable to “extreme weather,” achieve consecutive record harvests? The answer lies partly in something climate alarmists refuse to acknowledge: Rising levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) accelerate plant growth, and natural warming of the modern era favors agriculture far more than the chill of the Little Ice Age, from which the planet emerged 175 years ago.

Carbon dioxide is not the pollutant that climate pseudoscience alleges. It is plant food. Every botanist and farmer understands this, as did school children before indoctrination replaced education in many classrooms. Elevated CO2 levels boost photosynthesis, increase crop yields, and improve water-use efficiency in plants.

NASA states that “CO2 is making Earth greener,” noting that a rising atmospheric concentration has added 5% to global green leaf area over the past three decades. Studies of plant growth consistently demonstrate that crops like wheat, rice, and soybeans respond strongly to CO2 enrichment, with yield increases ranging from 15% to 30%.

Commercial greenhouse operators routinely boost productivity by elevating CO2 levels to 800-1,000 parts per million (ppm)—well above current atmospheric levels of 420 ppm. The results are striking: tomato yields increase by 40-50%, cucumber production rises by 30-40%, and growth of lettuce and other vegetables accelerates significantly.

This does not mean climate plays no role in agriculture. Of course it does. Rainfall, temperature, sunlight, and seasonal timing matter. The issue is whether the climate narrative accurately explains agricultural outcomes.

During the Little Ice Age, cold temperatures caused widespread crop failures. Growing seasons were brutally short. Frost destroyed harvests before they could mature. People starved in massive numbers across Europe and Asia. Today’s warmer temperatures and longer growing seasons are blessings.

Ours is an agricultural golden age. The air is richer in the compound that gives plants life. The weather is more conducive to growing food than it has been in centuries. The fabricated doomsday scenarios of the climate industrial complex are ludicrous.

Originally published at Real Clear Markets, June 5, 2026.

Vijay Jayaraj is a Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Fairfax, Virginia. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India. He served as a research associate with the Changing Oceans Research Unit at University of British Columbia, Canada.