Ownership, Compliance, and Climate Responsibility: Investigating the Role of Foreign versus Local Ownership in Carbon-Intensive Industries in India

Climate change has intensified debates over who should bear responsibility for the environmental impacts of carbon-intensive industries, particularly when production is increasingly spread across national borders.

The paper examines whether ownership structure influences environmental compliance in India by comparing six companies across the steel, cement, and thermal power sectors, including both Indian firms and foreign-owned subsidiaries or joint ventures. The analysis brings together evidence from corporate sustainability reports, government records, National Green Tribunal proceedings, environmental disclosures, and other publicly available sources to compare emissions intensity, renewable energy use, production or generation capacity, and regulatory compliance. While the foreign-owned firms in the steel and cement sectors generally show fewer recorded regulatory actions than their domestic counterparts, the overall picture is more nuanced. Differences in technology, regulatory capacity, and sector-specific conditions also play an important role in shaping environmental performance. Rather than presenting ownership as a single explanation for compliance outcomes, this study argues that it is one part of a broader institutional and political landscape.

By approaching ownership through the lens of global climate responsibility, the paper highlights how transnational investment can complicate questions of accountability for emissions produced within carbon-intensive industries