Solapur Launches its first ever Climate Action Plan for Sustainable and Resilient Development

WRI India supports Solapur Municipal Corporation to accelerate climate action.

23 January, Solapur: The Solapur Municipal Corporation (SMC) today launched the city’s first-ever Climate Action Plan (CAP) as part of Maharashtra’s concerted effort towards enabling sustainable development and climate resilience across 43 cities and urban clusters in the state.

Developed with technical support from WRI India, the objective of the Solapur CAP is to promote low-carbon, inclusive development focusing on conserving natural resources and building resilient systems for people, nature, and businesses. Solapur CAP is a roadmap for SMC’s commitment to combat climate change and build the city's climate resilience.

Solapur CAP focuses on two key strategies: Adaptation, enhancing the city’s capacity to cope with climate change impacts and mitigation, assessing present and future scenarios of greenhouse gas emissions and developing sectoral sub-strategies and actions to reduce emissions.

Extensive stakeholder consultations for the plan have helped identify six priority sectors for the city: Urban Heat and Greening, Sustainable Mobility, Water Resource Management, Air Quality, Sustainable Municipal Solid Waste Management, and Energy and Buildings. The goals, actions, and targets for each of these sectors have been outlined in the climate action plan.

In addition to sectoral strategies, a detailed governance and monitoring, evaluation and reporting framework has been developed. The proposed Environment and Climate Action Cell, as part of SMC, would play a critical role in data management and research, coordinate with other interdepartmental and parastatal agencies, and monitor the outcomes and outputs of the Solapur CAP.

The Solapur Climate Action Plan was unveiled in the presence of the Hon’ble Municipal Commissioner, Smt. Sheetal Teli-Ugale (IAS). In her address she said,

“Launching the Solapur Climate Action Plan (CAP) gives me immense pleasure. This is the first time a detailed Vulnerability Assessment and greenhouse gas emissions inventory has been prepared for Solapur City, which is in line with national and global commitments. As we advance, Solapur Municipal Corporation will focus on implementing various priority actions recommended under the CAP. We would set up an Environment and Climate Action Cell at SMC to implement and monitor the CAP progress.”

The Solapur CAP was launched by Hon’ble Municipal Commissioner Smt Sheetal Teli-Ugale (IAS) in the presence of Additional Municipal Commissioner II - Shri. Sandip Karanje, Additional Municipal Commissioner I – Nikhil More and Assistant Municipal Commissioner - Shashikant Bhosale. Shri. Abhijit Ghorpade, Director, Maharashtra State Climate Action Cell, Shri. Madhav Pai, CEO of WRI India and Jaya Dhindaw, Executive Program Director of Sustainable Cities, WRI India, attended the launch event virtually.

Highlighting the significance of climate action planning and climate governance, Shri. Abhijit Ghorpade, said, “Proud to share that Solapur leads the tier-2 cities by formulating its climate action plan. I thank the Municipal Commissioner and her team for all their support, and WRI India’s team for their relentless work. The City Action Plan is an important milestone in realising Maharashtra’s commitment towards net zero emissions. The real work starts now. The city will soon set up its Climate Action Cell to implement the plan”.

Madhav Pai, CEO WRI India said, “With the launch of the Solapur Climate Action Plan, Solapur city has a unique opportunity to lead in climate action through sustainable and resilient development and paving a way for Tier 2 cities in India. The CAP offers a systematic approach for climate-centric project development based on comprehensive baseline assessments and sectoral evaluations across six key areas: urban greening and heat mitigation, air quality, sustainable mobility, sustainable solid waste management, energy and buildings, and water resource management. WRI India is looking forward to collaborating with Solapur Municipal Corporation in ideating and demonstrating transformational projects, playing an integral role in Maharashtra and India’s net zero ambition.”