India has pledged that 60% of its installed electricity capacity by 2035 will come from non-fossil sources, the Union government said on Wednesday.

The government said that it also aims to cut by 47% the intensity of carbon emissions per unit of the gross domestic product from the 2005 level.

India aims to further increase its carbon sink to 3.5 billion tonnes to 4 billion tonnes through forest and tree cover by 2035 from the 2005 level. A carbon sink comprises elements such as forests, plants and soil that absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

The aims were announced as part of the Nationally Determined Contributions for the 2031-’35 period cleared by the Union Cabinet on Wednesday. The targets will be communicated to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The declarations are national climate action plans of each country under the 2015 Paris Agreement.

Under the 2015 agreement, countries had agreed to keep the long-term global average surface temperature well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5 degrees Celsius by the end of the 21st century.

A warming of more than 1.5 degrees Celsius can lead to severe climate change impacts and extreme weather. Pre-industrial levels refer to global atmospheric conditions before the widespread impact of industrialisation, which included burning coal, oil and gas and other such activities.

When the targets were last revised in August 2022, India had pledged that 50% of its installed electricity capacity would come from non-fossil sources by 2030. India had also committed to cut by 45% the intensity of carbon emissions per unit of the gross domestic product from the 2005 levels.

In October, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said that the commitments made by countries had proved inadequate despite growing scientific alarm at the speed of global temperature increases caused by the burning of fossil fuels – oil, coal and gas.

The lack of NDC ambition means the Paris goal of 1.5 degrees Celsius will be breached, at least temporarily, Guterres had warned.

The Union government said on Wednesday that the aims were in line with the target of attaining net zero carbon emissions by 2070, which was announced in 2021.