From the European Commission Joint Research Centre
Steep increase in global CO2 emissions despite reductions by industrialized countries
Global emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) – the main cause of global warming – increased by 45 % between 1990 and 2010, and reached an all-time high of 33 billion tonnes in 2010. Increased energy efficiency, nuclear energy and the growing contribution of renewable energy are not compensating for the globally increasing demand for power and transport, which is strongest in developing countries.
This increase took place despite emission reductions in industrialised countries during the same period. Even though different countries show widely variable emission trends, industrialised countries are likely to meet the collective Kyoto target of a 5.2 % reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2012 as a group, partly thanks to large emission reductions from economies in transition in the early nineties and more recent reductions due to the 2008-2009 recession. These figures were published today in the report “Long-term trend in global CO2 emissions,” prepared by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre and PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency.
The report, which is based on recent results from the Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR) and latest statistics for energy use and other activities, shows large national differences between industrialised countries. Over the period 1990-2010, in the EU-27 and Russia CO2 emissions decreased by 7% and 28% respectively, while the USA’s emissions increased by 5% and the Japanese emissions remained more or less constant. The industrialised countries that have ratified the Kyoto Protocol (so called ‘ratifying Annex 1 countries’) and the USA, in 1990 caused about two-thirds of global CO2 emissions. Their share of global emissions has now fallen to less than half the global total.
Continued growth in the developing countries and emerging economies and economic recovery by the industrialised countries are the main reasons for a record breaking 5.8% increase in global CO2 emissions between 2009 and 2010. Most major economies contributed to this increase, led by China, USA, India and EU-27 with increases of 10%, 4%, 9% and 3% respectively. The increase is significant even when compared to 2008, when global CO2 emissions were at their highest before the global financial crisis. It can be noted that in EU-27, CO2 emissions remain lower in absolute terms than they were before the crisis (4.0 billion tonnes in 2010 as compared to 4.2 billion tonnes in 2007).
At present, the USA emits 16.9 tonnes CO2 per capita per year, over twice as much as the EU-27 with 8.1 tonnes. By comparison, Chinese per capita CO2 emissions of 6.8 tonnes are still below the EU-27 average, but now equal those of Italy. It should be noted that the average figures for China and EU-27 hide significant regional differences.
Long term global growth in CO2 emissions continues to be driven by power generation and road transport, both in industrial and developing countries. Globally, they account for about 40% and 15% respectively of the current total and both have consistent long-term annual growth rates of between 2.5% and 5%.
Throughout the Kyoto Protocol period, industrialised countries have made efforts to change their energy sources mix. Between 1990 and 2010 they reduced their dependence on coal (from 25% to 20% of total energy production) and oil (from 38% to 36.5%), and shifted towards natural gas (which increased from 23% to 27 %), nuclear energy (from 8% to 9%) and renewable energy (from 6.5% to 8%). In addition they made progress in energy savings, for example by insulation of buildings, more energy-efficient end-use devices and higher fuel efficiencies.
The report shows that the current efforts to change the mix of energy sources cannot yet compensate for the ever increasing global demand for power and transport. This needs to be considered in future years in all efforts to mitigate the growth of global greenhouse gas emissions, as desired by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Bali Action Plan and the Cancún agreements.
The full report can be downloaded from: http://edgar.jrc.ec.europa.eu/index.php or http://www.pbl.nl/en
About the Joint Research Centre (JRC):
The Joint Research Centre (JRC) is the European Commission’s in-house science service. Its mission is to provide customer-driven scientific and technical support for the conception, development, implementation and monitoring of European Union policies.
The Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR) project uses the latest scientific information and data from international statistics on energy production and consumption, industrial manufacturing, agricultural production, waste treatment/disposal and the burning of biomass in order to model emissions for all countries of the world in a comparable and consistent manner. EDGAR is also unique in its provision of historical emission data for 20 years prior to 1990, the reference year for the Kyoto protocol.
PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency:
PBL is the national institute for strategic policy analysis in the field of environment, nature and spatial planning in The Netherlands and contributes to improving the quality of political and administrative decision-making by conducting outlook studies, analyses and evaluations in which an integrated approach is considered paramount. Policy relevance is the prime concern in PBL studies, for which independent and sound research is conducted.
The Kyoto Protocol: Annex I Parties:
The industrialised countries listed in this annex to the Convention committed to return their greenhouse-gas emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2000. They have also accepted emissions targets for the period 2008-12. They include the 24 original OECD members, the European Union, and 14 countries with economies in transition.
Non-Annex I Parties:
Refers to countries that have ratified or acceded to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change that are not included in Annex I of the Convention.
@ldd
In the atmosphere there are three types of carbon isotopes C-12, C-13 and C-14. C-12 is by far the most abundant. Plants prefer to absorb CO2 with C-12 in it.
As fossil fuels are made of ancient organic material, they have a relatively high amount of C-12 isotopes compared to the carbon present in the atmosphere, hydrosphere and lithosphere.
An increase in the ratio of C-12 over C-13 has in fact been observed in the atmosphere. Together with the account books of fossil fuel companies, this is pretty straightforward evidence that the observed increase in atmospheric CO2 is caused by the burning of fossil fuels and not by outgassing from volcanoes or the ocean.
Also, parallel with this trend, a decrease of atmospheric oxygen levels has been measured. This also indicates that the oxygen has been used to form CO2 molecules.
The evidence clearly does not support a volcanic origin.
Wil. I think you have hit the nail squarely on the head. I very much agree with your rant!
economic recovery by the industrialised countries are the main reasons for a record breaking 5.8% increase in global CO2 emissions between 2009 and 2010…
what recovery?
what planet do they live on?
Maurice Strong said “Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring about?”
C02 reduction was and is simply a means to an end, which essentially is world government. The fact that the U.S. Congress failed to ratify it was probably Kyoto’s biggest failure. The Organized Clime group, UNIPCC keeps the pressure on, though, continually threatening democratic principles under the guise of “science” and of “saving the planet”.
The USA could significantly reduce our CO2 footprint by only growing enough food to feed ourselves, or only refining enough gasoline and diesel for our domestic use (we export a great deal of gas and diesel) and by moving all our manufacturing to Asia.
“7 Billion now and will double within 50 years. If we think 7 billion now use resources and a third are starving now or living on the edge today you ain’t seen anything yet.”
No one is starving due to a global lack of food. They’re starving due to corrupt or non-existent government, and live in places where agriculture is poor.
Are they calling the US an industrialized country with CO2 on the rise? I thought most of US equipment, patents, and procedures were moved to the third world to escape taxes, EPA regulations and the evil of CO2 while taking advantage of cheap sometimes slave labor and making new customers for the US out of the third world because of their increased spending power. Un industrialized might be more accurate with fewer customers.
Wil says: 7 Billion now and will double within 50 years. If we think 7 billion now use resources and a third are starving now or living on the edge today you ain’t seen anything yet
Wil, I appreciate the sentiments, but get a grip. World population is NOT going to double in the next fifty years; in fact it is much more likely that it will top out at about 10 billion in the next seventy years and stabilize at about 3 billion in the next 200 years. One third of the globe is NOT starving. AS you so rightly pointed out, the U.S. and Canada are feeding the world – the hunger that exists is not because of a lack if food in the world but rather because of the lack if infrastructure to transport and store it (development, industrialization and modernization will take care of that…. if the Greenies will let them) and the horrific corrumption endemic to second and third world governments.
imo the data released by EDGAR should NOT be relied upon for much of anything. If you go to the details of how they put their emissions data together you will find in will have a very low level of accuracy. For individual countries EDGAR’s data is probably no more accurate than +/- 25%
To follow up on Wil’s points,
This chart could be more meaningful in many ways, but to just have it as CO2 per capita is silly. Everyone knows that China is the largest emitter of CO2 and it’s lead is increasing every day. The fact that they also have 4-5 times the population of the US makes them look “Greener” makes no sense. This should be a two or three part chart. The first being total emissions, second emissions vs sink ( This is where Canada would rank the best ), and the third emissions vs productivity. The third is the most crucial, since a large percentage of the US emissions results in benefits ( goods ) for the rest of the world the US value/ CO2 emission would be very high. Europe, on the other would have a very poor showing as very little of what they derive from their CO2 usage benefits anybody outside their borders. Europe also has a much lower emissions vs. sink character.
All that being said, that is still assuming that CO2 is bad which is dubious.
Tokyoboy – thanks for the answer
The Mauna Loa graph shows atmospheric CO2 concentration over time. The red curves shows the monthly mean value. I would think that if annual human emissions decreased, as they did in 2009, the red curve would flatten or go negative.
Since the curve does not flatten, what does that say about human impact on CO2 concentration? Either we’re so far above equilibrium we’d need to halve emissions to make an impact, or it doesn’t matter what we do because we’re not driving the change?
Matt says: September 21, 2011 at 8:58 pm
“Why doesn’t the Mauna Loa CO2 record reflect the 2009 decrease in global CO2 emissions? ……If atmospheric CO2 ppm is driven by human emissions, then shouldn’t we see a flattening of the smoothed curve sometime around 2009?”
The global CO2 emission curve shows an annual (or monthly) amount, and hence is the “rate of emission”.
In the Mauna Loa graph, the emission rate is reflected as the “slope of the curve”.
Therefore, a year-to-year variation of CO2 emission causes a change in the Mauna Loa slope, which is always positive when smoothed, and would not flatten nor exhibit a negative trend.
This is my understanding. Anyone correct me where I go wrong.
Okay, so why does the co2 record from hawaii look like a straight line, if co2 emissions are accellerating?
@James Baldwin Sexton
I actually agree with 99% of your postings. We do change our surroundings, it is what we do. I was just worried about the AGW verbiage since that is the wording used by the alarmist (or is that formerly used by the alarmists – aren’t they on to AGCC or some such now – it is hard to keep all their hot-cold speak straight.)Thought the alarmists had gotten to you there for a minute.
On other things: I agree with Wil on the coloring of the map. North America in general has a great many carbon dioxide sinks with the abundant forests and wetlands. I often wonder how the densely packed parts of the world can stand living so close to one another. To say Canada is an evil CO2 producer is a bit misleading – though I bet the CO2 production is much higher in winter as folks try to keep warm up there.
The key to this study is not the amount of CO2 concentrations, but the per capita CO2 emissions by country. Europe, which has lost a significant amount of heavy industry in recent years (some people argue that they simply exported it to China) and China which has over a billion people, do better than the US by virtue of statisical analysis. The US remains the culprit. Mission accomplished.
But, what the study glosses over is the lack of corresponding warming with each uptick of CO2 emissions. Perhaps that is why the Alarmists now focus soley on Extreme Weather and polar ice variations. What is also missing is the last IPCC projections concerning CO2, population growth trends and global GDP trends. One wonders if the IPCC will continue to predict global economic and population trends at all. The current global finance crisis and attendent recessions will give policiymakers a good oppurtunity to verify thier assumptions. I do get the feeling that the UN IPCC has little interest in such things.
I find the following statistic amazing:
nearly half the coal produced in the world is burnt in China and the percentage is increasing by nearly 5% per year.
Any drop in emissions by developed countries is purely an illusion as we enter a post industrial phase with most heavy industry transferring to the developing world
Here in the UK we have been patting ourselves on the back for regulations that have given us back clean fish filled rivers, whats happened in fact is that not regulation but the dissapearance heavy industry from alongside their banks has returned to their former natural state
No doubt the ever increasing pain of green taxation (£40b pa and rising) will be justified by governments and givernment funded research bodies pointing out the above irrelevant events though!
thedocrock
Great point you made emissions vs sink. Then you followed up by goods the US gives back to the world – you can’t get any better than that. And that doesn’t even begin to mention it is the US who are there in times of crisis anywhere in the world – the ONLY nation on planet earth capable of delivering services and desperately needed help to any spot on the planet with the kindest most caring people in the 4+ billion year history of earth. Most people on the planet would kill to live in so well managed and green a nation as the USA. Same with my nation, Canada, regards to green and well managed and giving back. Yet neither of us get any credit for anything. What’s with that? What is with the environmentalist who constantly attack the US and Canada while giving the rest of the world a free pass? We need to challenge these guys on this point time and time again. I am personally sick of that kind of propaganda and will challenge anyone who
Robert E. Phelan
I used Mexico as my population scale for the third world birth rate – for instance with a 2010 rate of natural increase in Mexico of 1.4%, its population would be expected to double in approximately 50 years from its 110.6 million people now to some 224 million in 2059. Will it? No one knows for certain. Just a best guess that is within the realm of possible. That is IF conditions remain somewhat the same. NOT likely. I am fully aware entire nations can rise and fall within a fifty year time span. But possible. That is unless we do indeed get a number of cold growing years then all bets are duly canceled and wiped off the books. Also very possible.
Gary Mount says:
September 22, 2011 at 3:20 am
LazyTeenager says:
Plants are green because their absorption band is optimal to collect energy from the sun.
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Ha ha ha. Wow.
Plants are green because all the other colours are absorbed by the leaf and the green colour is reflected (i.e. not absorbed) by the leave, and that is why it looks green.
Chlorophyll creates the green colour, because it absorbs wavelengths in the IR and part of the colour spectrum. They don’t absorb green light wavelengths, it is reflected (which is why you can see it). There are other pigments other than just chlorophyll in plants which absorb at wavelengths that chlorophyl misses out because it reflects nearly all ‘green light wavelengths’ so to speak. The shorter the wavelength, the more energy it has, which is why it is ‘optimal’.
In plants, it’s pretty efficient considering their low energy requirements, but if you notice, there are no higher mammals which use photosynthesis for their primary energy source.
Thats the sunlit side. The night side looks almost black. Especially the oceans.
I note that the Wikipedia “Climate change opinion by country” shows that in Japan, 99 percent of the people are aware of this ‘problem,’ 91 percent believe it has been caused by human activity, and 80 percent view it to be a threat to humanity. For the U.S.A, the equivalent numbers are listed as 97, 49, and 63, and for China, they are 62, 58, and 21. Perhaps this is the result of daily news coverage of the proceedings of the Kyoto conference and the comments made by the distinguished foreign visitors.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_opinion_by_country
Owen says:
September 22, 2011 at 8:16 am
@James Baldwin Sexton
I actually agree with 99% of your postings. We do change our surroundings, it is what we do. I was just worried about the AGW verbiage since that is the wording used by the alarmist (or is that formerly used by the alarmists – aren’t they on to AGCC or some such now – …….
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No worries, and thanks! I understand the verbiage is becoming increasingly difficult to keep up with. It seems now many words have a working definition and a separate connotation in how it relates to the CAGW/CC/AGCC/weirding…. whatever issue.
Openside50 says-
“Any drop in emissions by developed countries is purely an illusion as we enter a post industrial phase with most heavy industry transferring to the developing world.”
“Here in the UK we have been patting ourselves on the back for regulations that have given us back clean fish filled rivers, whats happened in fact is that not regulation but the dissapearance heavy industry from alongside their banks has returned to their former natural state.”
Openside- On this side of the Atlantic (next to the Pacific) we in California are use to the transfer of our industries to some other location. Yes we still buy all the products that we used to- we just don’t make them here anymore (i.e. closure of the joint venture between GM and Toyota- NUMI- pant in Freemont as one example). We are a bit concerned that even more of our business might leave the state (due to the high costs of doing business here) as we implement our CAP and Trade program (called AB 32 out here) hence we are going to try to minimize “leakage.” Which is defined by the California Resources Board as follows- ” Leakage means a reduction in emissions of greenhouse gases within the state that is offset by an increase in emissions of greenhouse gases outside of the state.”
http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/capandtrade/meetings/041309/presentation.pdf
The folks who provide electricity to the southern California (SCE) were a bit concerned about leakage and “competitiveness concerns.” as noted here- http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/capandtrade/meetings/041309/apr13pcsce.pdf .
I can see why the head of Exxon said it might be a bit more effective if the cap and trade program gets scrapped (due to high administrative costs and no transparency of costs) in favor a straight carbon tax approach to the perceived problem of excess CO2………………………..
Gary Swift says:
September 22, 2011 at 8:11 am
Okay, so why does the co2 record from hawaii look like a straight line, if co2 emissions are accellerating?
It isn’t a straight line. The emissions are going up slightly exponentially and as the increase in the atmosphere is a rather fixed percentage (the “airborne fraction”), it is going up slightly exponential too, but at a slower pace (and so do the sinks, as these absorb the difference):
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/temp_emiss_increase.jpg
“Smokey says: September 21, 2011 at 4:03 pm “….This has almost nothing to do with environmental policy anymore.”~ Ottmar Edenhofer, Co-Chair, UN/IPCC WG3”
Smokey, could you please lead me to the source (date & occasion) of this Dr. Edenhofer’s comment? Thanks.
“Andrew30 says: September 21, 2011 at 5:42 pm : Canadas Prime Minister sums it up…
“Kyoto is essentially a socialist scheme to suck money out of wealth-producing nations.””
Andrew, could you please lead me to the source (date & occasion) of this comment? Thanks.
I’m extermely interested in both ……..