Dubai, Sep 8 (IANS): India's Environment, Forest and Climate Change Minister, Bhupender Yadav, on Wednesday held a virtual meeting with UAE Climate Envoy and Industry and Advanced Technology Minister, Dr Sultan Al Jaber, and discussed issues regarding COP26, renewable energy and other related matters.

Stating that renewable energy and energy efficiency are among the key pillars of Indian climate change strategies, he said that under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, India has worked to make sure that renewable energy, particularly solar, becomes cheaper than energy from fossil fuels, a Ministry release said.

COP26, or, the annual Conference of Parties that are signatories to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), is to be held at UK's Glasgow this year.

Yadav further mentioned that India has already installed about 151 GW of non-fossil fuel installed capacity, or 39 per cent of the total capacity, and going ahead, declared an aspirational target of installing 450 GW of renewable energy by 2030.

He also mentioned the Hydrogen Energy Mission, global initiatives such as International Solar Alliance (ISA), Coalition of Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI), and leadership group for Industry Transition (LeadIT) and underlined the need for prioritising the concerns of developing countries, particularly in areas of implementation support including finance and technology.

Dr Jaber sought support of India for the UAE Initiative on Agriculture Innovation Mission for Climate (AIM-C) along with US and UK to be launched at COP26 to be held in Glasgow.