India is one of the main CO2 emitters in the world but unlike other developing countries it does not want to set itself emission reduction targets. It is advocating a continuation of Kyoto, whereby developing countries are under no obligation to reduce emissions.

India's carbon footprint is 1.4 billion tons of CO2 per annum (that's 23.3% that of the US), but in per capita terms, India only emits 1.2 tons per inhabitant, which is per se a model of sustainability. The problem is that 400 million people are without electricity, and it is predicted that economic development will reach these people sooner than expected, so India's carbon footprint can skyrocket in the coming decades to China's levels or beyond if the generation of electricity and economic development moves forward with old technologies and fossil fuel burning.

Of course no one wants to halt economic development anywhere in the world. Our challenge must be to combat climate change while keeping the lights on. This also applies to the developed world. No one should listen to the greener-than-thou who advocate to turn the heating down and the lights off, and reduce your comfort levels; turning your standby off will make no difference to climate change if utilities keep on burning coal. Our small collective efforts have negligible impact and the onus is on governments to articulate energy policy to decarbonise the production of electricity. We as individuals cannot do it: it's beyond our control.

I think that India eyes with suspicion the West's insistence to curb its carbon emissions, and interprets it as an obstacle to its own development. After all India's share to cumulative carbon emissions is about 2%, so it bears no responsibility for global warming.

However there are signs of dissent within the Indian government, perhaps because they themselves predict their carbon footprint will grow exponentially if something is not done about it. A leaked letter from the Indian environment minister argues that it would be in India's interest to curb emissions.

The highly visible president of the Maldives Mohamed Nasheed has been relentessly advocating for a technology transfer from developed countries to developing ones to fund their development during a transition of a low carbon economy. It is not clear how astronomical these figures are, but they could be on the high end of the hundreds of billions of dollars, comparable only to last year's financial bailout. India and China are the two obvious recipients of this financial interest, and this will be a key negotiating element to find a convergence of targets.

The timing is however all wrong, with the developed world still recovering from the credit crunch and maybe on the eve of plunging into a second dip with problems such as Dubai looming and other countries finding it hard to meet their debt liabilities.

It's not the right time to write blank cheques to the developing world, and developed countries may find they simply cannot afford to foot the bill.

Brunella