{"id":7954,"date":"2010-07-21T08:00:18","date_gmt":"2010-07-21T13:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.sustainablog.org\/?p=7954"},"modified":"2010-07-21T08:00:18","modified_gmt":"2010-07-21T13:00:18","slug":"causes-of-climate-change-carbon-dioxide-emissions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/causes-of-climate-change-carbon-dioxide-emissions\/","title":{"rendered":"Global Carbon Dioxide Emissions Fall in 2009 – Past Decade Still Sees Rapid Emissions Growth"},"content":{"rendered":"
By Amy Heinzerling<\/strong><\/p>\n In 2009, carbon dioxide (CO2<\/span>) emissions in China\u2014the world’s leading emitter\u2014grew by nearly 9 percent. At the same time, emissions in most industrial countries dropped, bringing global CO2<\/span> emissions from fossil fuel use down from a high of 8.5 billion tons of carbon in 2008 to 8.4 billion tons in 2009. Yet this drop follows a decade of rapid growth: over the 10 previous years, global CO2<\/span> emissions rose by an average of 2.5 percent a year\u2014nearly four times as fast as in the 1990s. Increasing temperatures and the resulting melting ice sheets and rising sea levels demonstrate the destructive effects of the carbon accumulating in the atmosphere.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Emissions in many wealthier countries fell in 2008 and 2009 as the global recession took hold. In the United States, CO2<\/span> emissions shrank by nearly 10 percent from 2007 to 2009, from a high of 1.58 billion tons of carbon to 1.43 billion tons, the lowest level since 1995. Emissions from oil, which is largely used for transportation, declined by nearly 11 percent, while those from coal, which is mainly burned to generate electricity, fell by over 13 percent.<\/p>\n The United Kingdom’s CO2<\/span> emissions fell by over 10 percent from 2007 to 2009. German emissions dropped by 8 percent, and French emissions dropped by 5 percent. Japan saw its emissions decline nearly 12 percent over the two-year period. (See data<\/a>.)<\/p>\n At the same time, CO2<\/span> emissions in the world’s most populous countries, China and India, continued to grow rapidly. China’s emissions rose to 1.86 billion tons of carbon in 2009, representing nearly a quarter of global emissions from fossil fuel burning. With average annual emissions growth of 8 percent over the past decade, China overtook the United States in 2007 as the world’s leading CO2<\/span> emitter. India’s emissions grew by close to 5 percent a year over the past decade; the country passed Russia in 2007 to become the world’s third largest emitter.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Still, emissions per person in developing economies remain far below those of most of the industrial world. The tiny nation of Qatar ranks highest in per capita emissions, at 11.5 tons of carbon per person in 2009, followed by several other oil-rich countries. Australia, the United States, and Canada lead the major industrial countries, emitting 4-5 tons of carbon per person in 2009. Per capita emissions in these countries are three times those in China and nearly four times the world average. At the same time, many European countries, such as the United Kingdom, Germany, and France, have comparable standards of living to the United States but emit only half as much carbon dioxide per person.<\/p>\n Emissions totals for individual countries include all fossil fuels burned within their borders. For manufacturing giants like China, this means that their total emissions include those resulting from the production of goods destined for other countries. A recent study<\/a> by researchers at Stanford University found that 22 percent of Chinese emissions resulted from the production of goods for export. The study also found that the manufacture of goods imported by the United States was responsible for 190 million tons of carbon emissions per year. If emissions totals were adjusted to account for Chinese exports and U.S. imports, the United States would again be the world’s leading emitter.<\/p>\n While fossil fuel use is responsible for the majority of carbon dioxide emissions, changes in land use, such as clearing forests for cropland, also emit a substantial amount of CO2<\/span>. In 2008, the most recent year for which data are available, global emissions from land use change were estimated at 1.2 billion tons of carbon. The vast majority of these emissions were from deforestation in the tropics; Indonesia and Brazil alone represent over 60 percent of land use change emissions.<\/p>\n \nCarbon Emissions Falling in Wealthier Countries<\/h2>\n
Causes of Carbon Dioxide Emissions<\/h2>\n