India must urgently create and fund roadmap to decarbonise its coal-based thermal power sector: Sunita Narain

India’s development goals include meeting its climate commitments for 2030 and beyond. The coal-powered thermal power plant (TPP) sector, a bulwark of the country’s economy, is also the largest contributor to its emissions portfolio, and hence, urgently requires a decarbonisation roadmap. The sector must modernise to balance rising energy demand with climate goals and address challenges around demand forecasting, fleet efficiency, alternative fuel co-firing, power purchase agreements, merit order dispatch and renewable integration through flexibilisation.

Delhi-based think tank Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) convened a day-long Round Table on June 30, 2025 to initiate discussions on this critical issue and present its own guidelines for decarbonising the sector. A new policy report was released on the occasion. The event brought together experts and stakeholders from government, industry, and civil society, aiming to support the development of a strategic framework for decarbonising coal-based power, while ensuring energy security.

Here are the excerpts from CSE Director General Sunita Narain’s address to the round table discussion:

“This is not a sector which, in a country like India, we can assume is going to go away.

So, when the Government of India — when the forecasts were put out in terms of what the energy scenario for India is going to be — what we saw was a very clear plan not to replace coal, but to displace coal.

And to me, and to CSE, that was an argument we have made the world over — that this is the only feasible argument for us. In a country that is today over 70 per cent dependent on the thermal power sector for its electricity needs, in a country that needs to double its energy consumption between now and 2030, the very idea that you can get rid of coal in the near future is simply not feasible.

So therefore, the solution we saw as very clear was that India will need to double its energy consumption between now and 2030 — but that doubling must happen through clean power.

Now, some years ago — and Ashokji (Ashok Lavasa, ex-secretary for Union Ministry of Environment and Climate Change) is here; he was, in fact, in the Ministry at that time — CSE had come out with a report on the thermal power sector in terms of local air pollution. At that stage, we had argued for NOx and particulate (PM) control systems, because clearly that is part of keeping the coal-based energy system going, but ensuring it does not contribute to local air pollution.

But today, the report is really to present to you a very inconvenient conversation, which I think needs to be had in this country: what is the road map, what is the pathway ahead, to decarbonise the thermal power sector in India?

It is not good enough for us to just talk about no coal; we must talk about decarbonising coal. It’s not a conversation people want to have, because it’s a very convenient thing to say coal will go. But I think it’s important for us in India to put out our own road map — and to put out a road map which, I believe, needs to be funded by the international community so that we can get decarbonisation going in a sector that is critical.

Because energy is economy, and there is no getting away from the fact that we need to grow our energy system — but we need a clean energy system, both for local air pollution and for the co-benefit of a global climate change, low-carbon system.

So this is really why this conversation — and I’m again really thrilled that we are able to bring together everybody in the sector. So Ashokji, the aim is really to bring together different parts of the sector — both from industry, civil society, people working on regulation, people interested in technology — and to be technology-neutral. We're looking at all the different options that exist, and trying to understand: what then is the road map going forward?

I'm not asking for an agreement — that’s not what we’re aiming for — but at least an open discussion, and a clear idea of what the road map needs to be. And then let’s hope we can come together with an agenda on how we move forward.”