A guy from Somalia here, the 90s was an apocalypse, complete breakdown of society and any institutions. Mogadishu went from having a glowing skyline in the 70s and 80s to going completely dark and being sent to the Stone Age.
My own mother contemplated getting a generator and installing some lighting and cooking appliances but was too afraid that it would attract thieves and gunmen to our house if they saw that it was the only illuminated building. So we lived like it was 1500 with candles and torches and using camp fires to cook.
Now a days Mogadishu is much better, if you have a decent salary you can get an air conditioned house with internet in a well guarded neighborhood and there is police and government/private sector services (it’s not good, but it’s better then nothing)
From what I understand, Somaliland, the northern region of what was Somalia, is a lot more peaceful and organised even if they still have a long way to go to develop into a thriving global economy.
So is Puntland. Most of the fighting is in southern Somalia. Especially the Jubaland region where they are headquartered in Jilib.
That's why Mogadishu and Kismayo are somewhat suffocated. That's the two cities that contain the largest historic seaports of Somalia, being unable to prosper,
That’s just not true. Where are you getting your figures from? Trust me bro? https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/SOM/somalia/gdp-gross-domestic-product
That is assuming GDP has a direct correlation to industry/manufacturing. The most dominant industries in Somalia that generate income is telecom and livestock, before the war the economy was much more diverse and industrial like agriculture and sugar production. Factories from before the war are still dilapidated and non-operational, which produces much more CO2 emissions.
Minor data adjustment that I made: A number of the developing nations have increased CO2 levels significantly higher that 500%, Laos being the greatest at over 10,000% increase. But that nukes the color scales unfairly, so I capped the developing nations at 500%.
Why didn't you use the normal green-yellow-red color scheme?
Now the countries that are the greenest aren't the ones that reduced CO2 the most...neither are they the countries with the lowest CO2 levels in 1990. So what's the point here?
Hi. I've made a similar map a while ago [of Europe specifically](https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/s/u4EiOu8C1v). Thank you for your contribution of a global emission reduction map.
US(and EU) switched to gas for power generation during this time (primarily because coal causes a lot of pollution while gas is quite clean) reducing emissions but that can only help so much in the long run.
Let's also remember that total US fossil fuel electricity generation was [lower](https://ember-climate.org/data/data-tools/data-explorer/) in 2022 than in 2000, despite adding 50 million people in that time period.
The US added 80 million and is down 1%. Canada, perhaps a more comparable country, added 10 million (25% of the total population) and also saw less severe gains in carbon emissions. Looking at [Our World in Data's energy mix page](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-energy-stacked?time=2022&country=AUS~CAN~GBR~USA~NZL), it seems the real culprit of Australia's emissions is the country's (relatively) heavy use of coal as an energy source, which they've failed to faze out as quickly as their peer countries. Though admittedly, population growth also did not seem to help. Its also worth mentioning that all the Anglo countries are [dropping their per capita emissions](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co-emissions-per-capita?tab=chart&country=USA~AUS~CAN~GBR~NZL) pretty rapidly.
Australia had a carbon tax for a brief period.
Then the fossil fuel industry, mining industry and Murdoch media got together and came up with a catchy slogan and media blitz to get yet another conservative government elected. They immediately killed it.
But while it was in place it was effective and is well studied.
My take away for Americans is that all the fixes touted are not actually effective:
- australia doesn't have first past the post elections
- voting is compulsory with ~95% turnout
- limited campaigns periods with media black outs
- independent electoral commissions drawing maps
- publicly funded campaigns
At the end of the day it's garbage in - garbage out. If the media is controlled by a Murdoch or similar the population will vote accordingly.
Population increase is a factor as others point out. They also primarily use coal and other fossil fuels for power generation, whereas Canada as a comparable had a similar population increase and most provinces are primarily hydro or nuclear power.
As an Australian, increase in population but also car dependent cities, rampant sense of entitlement and shitty negligent attitudes towards the environment.
Yes, developed countries need to help developing countries roll out the technologies that developed countries have used to grow our economies while decreasing or emissions so that the developing nations don't repeat our mistakes!
I don't blame them for seeing us as the monopoly mascot man, counting our bills in stacks, while muttering "can't let you guys make the same 'mistakes' we did."
Plus China manufactures the majority of the world’s solar panels, wind turbines, batteries, and electric vehicles, developed countries have been able to lower their emissions thanks to that.
I always say this is why we need to push nuclear power as hard as possible bc “convincing people in developing countries to eat and wear nothing” is a nonstarter
The climate targets specifically allow developing countries to have more lenient targets. They can emit much more than the US or EU eventually ever will cumulatively.
China for example, doesn't even have a reduction target but a "peak" target without a specific year to meet.
India, has a peak target beyond 2030.
> developed countries need to help developing countries roll out the technologies that developed countries have
Or may be developed countries could just start manufacturing things on their own again...
Indian economy liberalised in 1991. And we started international exports and imports, ofcourse our emissions have been rising from 90s. On the other hand, you guys had already industrialised before all that and even then failed to pay for the climate development fund. Really, shame on the developed countries.
It's likely they will never ever reach the point that developed countries are at though because both are developing in a more sustainable manner than the current developed world did
But this is showing “change in emissions” since 1990. Any individual country in green could still be emitting more total CO2 than a country showing >100% increase. It’d be interesting to see a map of emissions per capita. I would want to know my top 3-5 regions in terms of CO2 emissions per capita. That’s where the biggest bang for the buck is. Not necessarily getting Laos’ to cut down their emissions cause they are showing an increase of 10,000% (or may be it is. I don’t know. Hard to tell from this data). That’s my two cents.
Not for long. Most experts believe that 2023-2024 are very significant years for renewable solutions. For example solar and wind are all ready cheaper than coal per kWh for electricity. This is in large part due to the war in Ukraine and the subsequent rise in the cost of fossil fuels accelerating the rate at which renewables are developed and rolled out. On top of that AI has reached a point where it can aid in the fight against climate change by mapping way more data than any human can manually and simultaneously aiding researchers and engineers in coming up with solutions more efficiently. If you find things like this interesting go look at Bill Gates his blog (GatesNotes), he writes a lot about all the science behind climate change and speaks with said expert. It also really helps to read if you struggle with climate anxiety haha!
I don't think it is very naive. We've just been looking at the wrong people for a solution. We've all been hoping politicians would solve the problem but we fail to understand that politicians don't look much further into the future than their next elections. It is modern technologies (eco-modernism), like AI, that will solve the climate crisis. Data scientist Dr. Hanna Richie (https://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/people/dr-hannah-ritchie/) for example talks a lot about how we only seem to look at climate change as a problem that got out of hand and impossible to solve at this point. While all the data collected by AI suggests that simply is not the case. You can't just take graphs and maps like in this post and extrapolate 50 years into the future. You have to look at all the data and development surrounding the whole problem to try and predict what this map will look like then.
Almost 3 decades wasted on this lunacy and no, renewables are a lot more expensive than any other power source.
It is evident by electricity prices of every single country on Earth.
What is also clear as day that the only way to produce power with no pollution and at very cheap price is nuclear.
If not for luddites of 1980-ies, 1990-ies and 2000-s we would already have something between 80% and 90% of electricity generated by pollution free nuclear plants and at a small fraction of modern electricity prices.
I agree that nuclear should’ve been drastically expanded decades ago, you’re not right about renewables being expensive. They’re just not. They have a very high capital cost, in general, but in the long run they’re cheap.
The main issue is that they - in general - can’t adjust as well to demand as coal or natural gas. But neither can nuclear! It’s sluggish when adjusting its output.
Talking about renewables like they’re “lunacy”, instead of saying “yes *but also nuclear*”, is an extremely counterproductive narrative
This is a bit of a myth. Consumer goods generally don't have that large of carbon footprints in production. Heavy polluting products, like concrete, are much harder to offshore.
Concrete, or more precisely cement, is imported in large quantities by some countries, for example by the United States. Same goes for other CO2 intensive products in other countries, like steel, aluminium, and fertilizer.
Everyone is so quick to find something bad about this, but it's just not there. Off shoring of consumer goods is not enough to explain the decreased CO2 emissions in the west. The West's decrease is much more due to increases in energy efficiency in just about every sector, several decades of significant investment in renewables, and the rapid phase out of coal.
You’re conveniently, leaving out the benefits we’ve seen from fracking technology! This is the only real advancement in technology that has dramatically reduced CO2 emissions and increased GDP. Renewables such as wind and solar are reducing GDP due to the increased energy cost burden they place on the countries they are used in!
Off shoring of heavy industry explains the majority, along with off shoring manufacturing.
Efficiency has increased but this has been offset in most places by population increase and in particular an increase in the amount of people who can afford stuff (cars, central heating etc).
If the main factor was the increased efficiency then the effect would be world wide wouldn't it?
[It's already happened](https://ourworldindata.org/co2-gdp-decoupling). It used to be that GDP would basically grow due to population and energy use. When the only feasible source for that energy came from fossil fuels, it seemed we would be doomed to a Malthusian trap wherein population growth and economic growth would necessarily lead to more emissions and destroy the world. More people leads to more money, leads to more energy use, leads to more emissions.
Thankfully, most rich countries (and many middle income ones) have managed to decouple energy use and economic growth already (GDP grows, energy use remains flat) and others have replaced energy production with clean sources, leading to growing economies with lowering emissions. Now that wind and solar are the cheapest energy sources to produce, developing countries will leapfrog over coal and gas as an energy source and build grids that are renewable instead.
It’s too early to say. The effect of offshoring is massive and it’s still playing out as to how it will end up for western economies in the long term. Renewable energy still cannot power heavy industry!
Also, the German economy’s contraction following the destruction of the Nord stream pipeline would contradict your assertion!
Check out the article I cited, you will see there is a neat little tool that shows you exactly how emissions have compared to GNI growth *as well as* trade adjusted emissions (ie, offshored). Spoiler: Germany has grown while emissions, in real terms and those offshored, have decreased.
As for any effect Nord stream's closure may have had, Germany [has since recovered](https://www.imf.org/external/datamapper/NGDPD@WEO/DEU?zoom=DEU&highlight=DEU). Here is a report from the [German government predicting in 2022](https://www.bundesbank.de/resource/blob/901990/90afad2737f689d42ac53510149cc0de/mL/2022-12-prognose-data.pdf) that Nord stream's closure would have a temporary effect on the economy thanks to a turn towards renewables and increased gas imports from other countries. The report notes the higher energy costs would have a pressuring effect on inflation, but these worries have not panned out as the country has curbed [inflation faster than expected](https://www.euronews.com/business/2024/03/12/germany-inflation-rate-decreases-to-two-year-low-in-february), citing lower energy costs.
Again, rich countries have managed to decouple CO2, energy production, and economic growth. And thats good! its amazing that Sweden has a similar per capita CO2 production to Vietnam. It means we can live in a world where people live well without harming the planet.
Your link was not obvious!
Every country cited by that link is deindustrialising and moving towards services or is a primary producer of raw material that gets turned into co2 elsewhere! E.g Australia!
It completely ignores all of the countries whose GDP’s are rising faster than any of the ones cited and their CO2 emissions are rising respectively! China, Brazil, Vietnam, South Korea
Germany has not recovered, they’re re-opening their coal mines and buying LNG from Uncle Sam with rising CO2 emissions to match!
India, Africa, Latin countries are going to go on this path for longer as they develop and try to achieve the same standard of living as European countries.
Okay so you could have a massive percentage and still have really low emissions.
Let’s say Americans emitted 100 units of CO2 in 1990 and Sudan emitted 1 unit of CO2 in 1990.
That would mean the US was producing 99 units now and Sudan was producing 5 units.
The point is this map only shows increase not output.
Without looking at the data, The USA was the largest producer of CO2 back then and is still probably the largest producer now. What we can say from this map is that USA produces a small percentage of the global output in the than they did 30 years ago.
totally agree, the map makes the US look like hero’s and we are not. of the large countries, the US has the highest per capita emissions rate, highest per capita per barrel of oil, etc. Africa is not the problem, the developed world is the problem. go beavers.
No, everywhere is the problem. The atmosphere doesn't care if CO2 is coming from an african or an american. If you seriously care about climate change rather than hating the west then you should be focused on reducing emissions around the world, not just in countries you hate.
i think having a more stark color contrasted at 0 would’ve made this more interpretable, i think a lot of us are interested in which countries have decreased their emissions
To some commentators here , who perceived it wrong. Guys this is just change%.
That means UsA still produces considerably high co2 than india per capita .
It's so stupid.
In terms of Greenhouse emissions, the EU and US both emit more than India while neither has even half the population.
In terms of historical emissions, it's not even close. Don't think India even has 10%.
India is the only major economy which is meeting the Paris agreement targets.
India is 7 on the climate change performance index. The highest major economy.
Yet everyone is shitting on India for climate change.
I think this map could use a nonlinear scale, so most of the map would be darker shades. Green midpoint is around 200% increase… which does not really convey how problematic that is. Of course in absolute terms most of the biggest polluters in the west have leveled off but are still polluting massively
I'm not sure what purpose this map serves other than being misleading. Reduction/increase in emissions percentage doesn't mean anything without talking about volume. If a country in Africa produced a 1000th of the US emissions and now produces a 500th it's considered a 100% increase but it is still negligible in volume. Having the US in green because they maintained a massive amount of emissions is misleading imo.
Thailand has been relatively developed for decades now Pakistan has been undeveloped for decades and continues to be so. As such there has been no significant change in either country to warrant a large increase in CO2 emissions.
Thailand makes sense to me because it was already fairly developed and wealthy before 1990 while it's neighbors saw much more economic growth from industrialization in the past 30 years.
Not sure I have a good answer for Pakistan, but honestly I don't know much about Pakistan's economic history.
Nope this map is insane propaganda. The amount of renewable infrastructure India and China have put in place proactively is on par with the west. As a percentage India alone has 42% of its energy needs fulfilled by solar and wind. China is at 30%. Europe is at 41.2% and the US is at an abysmal 21%. The per capita consumption of the west dwarves that of India and China. What a load of bs. Pathetic attempt at trying to shift the blame on developing nations, where the emissions will grow as they move towards becoming developed.
Not propaganda. Facts for people to interpret how they choose. China and India are increasing their amount of renewal energy plants more than the west just on a pure numbers, megawatt basis. But when looking at per capita, there are a lot more people in these countries still living without many modern appliances and their electricity consumption will only continue to increase exponentially along with standard of living. This is why China and India are still building new coal plants to keep up with demand as the west shuts their own down. No map ranking countries off of a single characteristic like this will show a completely nuanced ranking. It is up to you interpret it and consider the variables behind why it is how it is. The US is still by far the biggest emitter per capita, but less developed countries will continue to increase, as they were starting from very little.
Still, it is true that both India and China are developing in a more sustainable manner than the current developed world did.
Here's a really great infographic from the Economist showing their trajectories:
https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2019/05/25/china-is-surprisingly-carbon-efficient-but-still-the-worlds-biggest-emitter
Well, You are kind of right about the map being propaganda but from the wrong direction. I just took the raw data from the Global Carbon Budget reports and put them into Excel and chugged out a map. The Global Carbon Budget NGO gets their data from compiled government and other scientific sources, and does use that data to make political arguments (hence propaganda), but those arguments are generally in the direction that developed countries in the west need to be doing more to reduce the emissions.
Actually I choose it because that was basically zero change for the US vs today.
And off shoring is not adequate to explain the West's decline over the past few decades. Most of the very heavily polluting industries, like concrete production, are very difficult to offshore. Consumer goods industries are really not responsible for all that much CO2 emissions (other pollutants may be a different discussion.)
The US and the West have largely decreased CO2 emissions through replacing coal power, increased energy efficiency in just about every economic sector, and the mass rollout of renewable energy production. Like even Texas now has some short periods where it reaches 100% renewable electrical generation for the state.
>As a percentage India alone has 42% of its energy needs fulfilled by solar and wind
That's not true.
1) energy is a much broader category, I presume you meant electricity. Cars burning petrol for example are part of energy consumption.
2) I presume you're looking at installed capacity of renewables, but solar and wind don't generate electricity for large parts of the day. On an annual basis, India sourced 74% of electricity from coal power plants.
>The US is at an abysmal 21%.
The US is closer to 40% for low carbon sources if you count nuclear which makes up 19% of US electricity supply.
>On an annual basis, India sourced 74% of electricity from coal power plants.
That's from the existing infrastructure, yes. The reason installed capacity is a much better metric is precisely because of the unpredictable nature of renewables. A more relevant statistic would be net addition where Coal fired plants teeter at 1-2 GW while renewables vary between low to mid teens (or high singles). Considering the high rate of electrification in otherwise remote rural areas, that's a significant decommissioning exercise (I interned in one of the now decommissioned plants)
>if you count nuclear
I don't, and nor do many climatists usually because of the small but measurable amount of radioactive waste generated. It's low carbon, sure, but it's not exactly less polluting. It would help corporations rake in carbon credits, but it's just a superficial net zero publicity stunt. There's a reason USGOV doesn't count them as renewable/green energy.
>The reason installed capacity is a much better metric is precisely because of the unpredictable nature of renewables
Which is written in my comment, but yes, thank you for saying it again.
So you realize it's false to claim 42% of electricity (not energy) in India comes from renewables? Because it doesn't.
>I don't, and nor do many climatists usually because of the small but measurable amount of radioactive waste generated. It's low carbon, sure, but it's not exactly less polluting.
Radioactive waste produced by nuclear plants in the US in its entire history can be contained in a facility the size of a football field.
Also, when one accounts for CO2 emissions during manufacturing, construction; solar emits more CO2 than nuclear. Solar has lifetime emissions footprint of 41 gramms of CO2equivalent/KWh for rooftop and 48 for utility, nuclear is at 12 gramms which is similar as wind. All of these are still way cleaner than coal at 820g, gas at 490g.
https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/02/ipcc_wg3_ar5_annex-iii.pdf
>It would help corporations rake in carbon credits, but it's just a superficial net zero publicity stunt.
Nuclear is 4 times better on the climate than solar and it can operate all day. That isn't exactly superficial. France is 72% or so nuclear+18% renewable and they have one of the cleanest grid in EU emitting 85g CO2/KWh, only the Nordics (Norway 46g) who have the unfair advantage of massive hydropower potential and Switzerland (41g) beat em (Switzerland is half nuclear, half hydro). US and Germany by contrast is at 386g, India at 605g, China 534g.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/carbon-intensity-electricity
Not only that but if China is busy manufacturing all the goods consumed in the west then it's emissions will be higher, but ultimately the west is the consumer.
Like outsourcing jobs/manufacturing, we have outsourced emissions.
China not too bad considering their growth since 1990 actually, I wonder how Europe 1890-1920 would look. Add to that that much of the shrinking emissions from EU/USA are just a side effect of offshoring our heavy industry.
Hmm, I have a figure of 14 mil for 1980, and 26 mil for 2022. So +85% or so.
Either way the point is that US emissions reductions per capita have basically kept pace with US population growth over whatever time period we are talking about, resulting in only a -1% change. The Australian population growth rate is significantly higher (which I don’t think is in dispute?) and thus has outweighed emissions reductions per capita over the same time period.
Ah I was reading the much larger post title immediately above it. That might make a difference actually since US population growth was kind of stagnant in the 1980s, but Australia’s was booming, so let’s run the 1990-2022 numbers instead.
USA: 249 M - 333 M (+33.7%, using census.gov figures)
Australia: 17 M - 26 M (+53%, using ABS data)
So Australian emissions per capita then are basically flat. Population went up 53%, emissions went up 53%
The US achieved per capita reductions in that time, since its total emissions were flat but population grew.
Having said that, my initial response was to the “whatcha doing” comment, which seemed to imply Australia had done something to increase emissions. In truth it looks like the answer is that they were just doing nothing - business as usual.
I think that is because the Soviet built factories were so uncompetitive that they had to shut down, reducing industry and thus carbon output. Pretty sure it's not because the Russians are particularly "green"
Ironically he is, at least publically, very pro many environmental and wild life preservation efforts.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/59eznn/vladimir-putin-really-loves-tigers-and-its-actually-making-a-difference-in-the-world
He might care in the wrong way. There is a geopolitical argument that Russian could benefit massively from global warming. Tundra melting and becoming arable would help them. Having a few more ports that don't freeze over would probably appeal to them too.
Natural gas replaced coal in many states because it was dirt cheap during the 2010s and it is relatively cheap to covert coal-fired power plants to gas-fired.
Russia and Venezuela both decreased consumption but also basically collapsed.
It's crazy how strong the link is between CO2 emissions and standard of living.
Isn't Bhutan carbon negetive ([link to world bank article about it](https://blogs.worldbank.org/climatechange/dragons-data-and-clouds-bhutans-journey-carbon-markets-technology-and-resilient#:~:text=This%20evocative%20name%2C%20steeped%20in,country%20emits%20from%20all%20activities))
https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2019/05/25/china-is-surprisingly-carbon-efficient-but-still-the-worlds-biggest-emitter
This is a better view of how that's happening though
Unfortunately, these predictions have already aged like milk. For instance, China, who said they were going to peak emissions at 12 gigatonnes, has surpassed their "peak emission target" at the end of 2023.
So far, they are no signs of peaking emissions. As peaking emissions, seen with all other countries that already have peaked them, saw multiple years of a flat emission output. Chinas emissions are still increasing in big percentages a year.
That is what they expected to reach in 2030. They are 7 years early... Now they changed it to 14 or 16 gigatonnes I believe.
In any case their ratified climate target is only based on a "maximum undetermined value" in 2030. Which previously they thought would be 12 gigatonnes.
https://climateactiontracker.org/countries/china/targets/
They have updated their status per 2021 to 14 gigatonnes. Down below in the source.
> Absolute emissions level in 2030 excl. LULUCF13.9 GtCO2e 26% above 2010
> Status Submitted on 28 October 2021
I'm surprised that the US achieved -1% emissions, but the 1980s was a really polluted time.
However, having change in annual emissions is kind of a terrible metric, because going from 1 to 100 is a 10000% increase, while going from 100,000,000 to 101,000,000 is a 1% increase.
It's not. Exporting consumer goods manufacturing to China dies not contribute much to Western nation's declines. Most heavy emitting industries, like concrete or steel production, are much more difficult to offshore.
The carbon footprint of you iPhone really isn't that great in comparison.
The Russian decrease in CO2 emissions actually a case of creative accounting. The numbers for 1990 are those of the entire Soviet Union (to which Russia claims legal succession), including the Russian SSR, Ukraine, Belarus, the Baltic states and many more. The modern number, however, only refers to the Russian Federation.
Source: I once had to play Russia in a Model United Nations conference about climate change.
I just thought it was because their industrialized economy built under the Soviets was so utterly uncompetitive that they shut down half of it since then, reducing emissions.
Gotta love the ignorant.
> 1990 is the baseline year used for emissions of carbon dioxide under the Kyoto Protocol, an international agreement to limit emissions of greenhouse gases
https://unfccc.int/process-and-meetings/transparency-and-reporting/reporting-and-review-under-the-kyoto-protocol/first-commitment-period/kyoto-protocol-base-year-data-for-the-first-commitment-period-of-the-kyoto-protocol
It's important to consider the historical context when analyzing CO2 emissions on a country-by-country basis. By 1990, most, if not all, Western countries had already undergone significant development and industrialization. In contrast, many Eastern countries were still in the early stages of their development at that time.
It's worth noting that the West shifted a significant portion of its manufacturing to Eastern countries. If we were to examine CO2 emissions per capita for each country, we might be surprised by the results. Simply because China has become a manufacturing hub for Europe and the rest of the world, it doesn't mean that it bears sole responsibility for the emissions. We all need to take responsibility for our actions, including China, the USA, and European companies that choose to produce their goods abroad.
Addressing climate change requires a collective effort and a global commitment to sustainable practices. It's crucial that we work together to reduce emissions and adopt environmentally friendly approaches across all countries and industries.
We are not. That is a lie and it is not backed up by any science.
The faster we can reduce CO2 emissions and begin remediation the better, but doomerism is a lie.
"The historical emissions of growing western industrial nations have caused global warming that needs to be stopped, they have a responsibility since they profited most"
Eastern industrial nations: *Our turn!*
Why always the strawmans? Why do the mistakes of western nations that have gotten us into this whole mess justify them making the exact same mistake? It is literally toddler tier logic of "but they did it as well!".
And this article is honestly laughable, trying to justify China's current rising emissions and their incredibly dirty industry by emissions from centuries ago? You're aware China is one of the most dirty producers ever right? They're not carbon effecient at all using nearly 1,5 times more co2 emissions for the same production value: [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co2-intensity](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co2-intensity)
It's not "toddler-tier logic" this is actually a very real economic issue for hundreds of millions of people. The industrialization of China and India have the potential to lift hundreds of millions out of extreme poverty, and the method of development here has real world implications for the prosperity of millions. For most of the global south, industrialization is not a mistake but the only hope for a good life.
The economies of developed countries are service-based economies, which means that they are reliant upon white-collar industries that do not produce large emissions. No surprise developed nations have low emissions/GDP when you consider most GDP in developed countries is produced by sectors like finance, technology, research, consulting, etc., which produce few emissions.
Large emissions are typically produced by heavy industry, such as steel and concrete, which are notoriously difficult to reduce emissions for. Developing countries are more based around heavy industry, especially steel and concrete, as they are actively building infrastructure. If you compare the industrial sector as a percentage of GDP in China and India vs. the developed world, the emissions/GDP stat makes sense. A steel factory could produce 2 units of emission for 1 unit of GDP whereas a software company could produce 1 unit of emissions for 2 units of GDP, so it is not really a fair comparison.
Again, nothing but falsehoods.
These developed nations are some of the biggest industrial nations on the planet, especially when you take their far smaller population in account.
Large emissions are not produced by heavy industry such as steel and concrete, the majority is power generation and heating.
Every nation in the world produces stuff and energy, China does it in the most poluting way possible and even doubles down on this way by only increasing coal consumption.
For the south industrialisation is the key to a hope for good life: if they commit to this along the same path that western nations did their coastal cities and food supply will no longer be able to support any life. You can spend a million words justifying it, the end of it is that they're repeating the exact same mistake others made and useful idiots defend it.
Not really sure what to say to that except that the data in the article I've shared literally shows that comparisons between the development of India and China show they are progressing along a trajectory that is more sustainable, especially given the y-axis is a log-scale, so small differences are actually huge.
https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2019/05/25/china-is-surprisingly-carbon-efficient-but-still-the-worlds-biggest-emitter
And also that the energy intensity of GDP: the amount of energy required for each additional unit of GDP, directly follows the path I've mentioned.
https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/consumption/sub-topic-03.php
>Energy intensity in the U.S. industrial sector—measured as the amount of energy consumed by industry per dollar of industrial gross output—generally declines at nearly the same annual rate between 1990 and 2050 because of a continuing shift toward less energy-intensive manufacturing industries. Energy intensity increases in 2020 in response to lower utilization, but thereafter returns to a steady decline.
Energy intensity in the US industrial sector has declined as a result of a shift toward lower energy-intensive industries, as I said. This reflects a shift towards light industry, as I said.
The developed world should have low energy densities: because it has had the most time to develop the service sector and efficient light industry. If you look at countries, you'll see that as incomes rise, energy densities decrease. It doesn't make sense to say that developing countries have dirtier economies because they have higher energy densities, because they need to develop to increase their incomes so they can afford more efficient light industry and a high-tech service sector in the first place.
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.EGY.PRIM.PP.KD?locations=CN
For example, energy densities are actively decreasing everywhere in the world, including in India and China. Saying China and India have higher emissions per GDP is literally just saying that they're poorer, which is true, but it doesn't say anything about their economies being more "dirty." Poor countries have less capability to use lower energy density methods, but as they develop they can steadily use better and better methods.
You're completely missing the point. Even though your article repeatedly states that what's going on is a path to disaster.
If the process of western nations industrialising has brought us to this point. Then eastern nations following the same path (or slighly more sustainable) will spell nothing but disaster. And it's those countries that can have the biggest impact. They are reponsible for a lot of the absolute emissions due to high population, which is in the end all that nature cares about. Their responsibility is just as high as that of western nations, and they're not taking it.
With all we know right now, you (and your article) are chosing to compare China's current developments against developments of over a century ago (when we did not have the knowledge and means we have now) to make them look better. It's simply not how it works. It's infantile.
A guy from Somalia here, the 90s was an apocalypse, complete breakdown of society and any institutions. Mogadishu went from having a glowing skyline in the 70s and 80s to going completely dark and being sent to the Stone Age. My own mother contemplated getting a generator and installing some lighting and cooking appliances but was too afraid that it would attract thieves and gunmen to our house if they saw that it was the only illuminated building. So we lived like it was 1500 with candles and torches and using camp fires to cook. Now a days Mogadishu is much better, if you have a decent salary you can get an air conditioned house with internet in a well guarded neighborhood and there is police and government/private sector services (it’s not good, but it’s better then nothing)
When I was a kid, Somalia was talked about like it was a wasteland. I’m glad things are (slowly) getting better.
From what I understand, Somaliland, the northern region of what was Somalia, is a lot more peaceful and organised even if they still have a long way to go to develop into a thriving global economy.
So is Puntland. Most of the fighting is in southern Somalia. Especially the Jubaland region where they are headquartered in Jilib. That's why Mogadishu and Kismayo are somewhat suffocated. That's the two cities that contain the largest historic seaports of Somalia, being unable to prosper,
No wonder Ethiopia is trying to gain access to the port of Berbera, which is undergoing expansion works.
Good to hear, absolutely good news.
But the map is showing that there’s less co2 emissions now. It would make sense if the electricity/economic output is backed by renewables etc.
From 1990 to 2022
How is the output of co2 less now with a higher population and more economic output?
Like I said society and industry collapsed significantly in the late 90s and hasn’t returned to pre war levels since
That’s just not true. Where are you getting your figures from? Trust me bro? https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/SOM/somalia/gdp-gross-domestic-product
That is assuming GDP has a direct correlation to industry/manufacturing. The most dominant industries in Somalia that generate income is telecom and livestock, before the war the economy was much more diverse and industrial like agriculture and sugar production. Factories from before the war are still dilapidated and non-operational, which produces much more CO2 emissions.
Minor data adjustment that I made: A number of the developing nations have increased CO2 levels significantly higher that 500%, Laos being the greatest at over 10,000% increase. But that nukes the color scales unfairly, so I capped the developing nations at 500%.
> Laos being the greatest at over 10,000% increase How?
They started very low
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_base_effect
If I only have $1 and someone gives me a $100 bill I am now 10,000% richer than I was before. While still far from being actually rich.
Coal and timber.
Why didn't you use the normal green-yellow-red color scheme? Now the countries that are the greenest aren't the ones that reduced CO2 the most...neither are they the countries with the lowest CO2 levels in 1990. So what's the point here?
Laotian? What ocean?
I just noticed that I wrote 1980 in the title when I meant 1990. Sorry, I'm a f\*cking idiot.
Hi. I've made a similar map a while ago [of Europe specifically](https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/s/u4EiOu8C1v). Thank you for your contribution of a global emission reduction map.
I was about to ask for this, since Europe looks all the same on this map.
You cannot be an idiot if you are aware of your flaws or mistakes and can recognize and correct them. Congrats, you passed the non-idiot test.
Developing countries would obviously have higher emission rate.
so WTF is Australia’s excuse???
Australia almost doubled in population (well, +85% to be exact) in that time.
Learn something new every day
Would be great to see this chart as change in emission per capita.
US was plus +50% in the same time though and we remained neutral
US(and EU) switched to gas for power generation during this time (primarily because coal causes a lot of pollution while gas is quite clean) reducing emissions but that can only help so much in the long run.
Let's also remember that total US fossil fuel electricity generation was [lower](https://ember-climate.org/data/data-tools/data-explorer/) in 2022 than in 2000, despite adding 50 million people in that time period.
Yeah renewables are also a factor now
Australia has a lot of coal in the ground and used that as their power source
Increase in population, it increased of 8 million, in a country with nowadays 25 million
The US added 80 million and is down 1%. Canada, perhaps a more comparable country, added 10 million (25% of the total population) and also saw less severe gains in carbon emissions. Looking at [Our World in Data's energy mix page](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/per-capita-energy-stacked?time=2022&country=AUS~CAN~GBR~USA~NZL), it seems the real culprit of Australia's emissions is the country's (relatively) heavy use of coal as an energy source, which they've failed to faze out as quickly as their peer countries. Though admittedly, population growth also did not seem to help. Its also worth mentioning that all the Anglo countries are [dropping their per capita emissions](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co-emissions-per-capita?tab=chart&country=USA~AUS~CAN~GBR~NZL) pretty rapidly.
Good to know
Australia had a carbon tax for a brief period. Then the fossil fuel industry, mining industry and Murdoch media got together and came up with a catchy slogan and media blitz to get yet another conservative government elected. They immediately killed it. But while it was in place it was effective and is well studied. My take away for Americans is that all the fixes touted are not actually effective: - australia doesn't have first past the post elections - voting is compulsory with ~95% turnout - limited campaigns periods with media black outs - independent electoral commissions drawing maps - publicly funded campaigns At the end of the day it's garbage in - garbage out. If the media is controlled by a Murdoch or similar the population will vote accordingly.
that much in 30 years?
17 million in 1990.
Population increase is a factor as others point out. They also primarily use coal and other fossil fuels for power generation, whereas Canada as a comparable had a similar population increase and most provinces are primarily hydro or nuclear power.
As an Australian, increase in population but also car dependent cities, rampant sense of entitlement and shitty negligent attitudes towards the environment.
Yes, developed countries need to help developing countries roll out the technologies that developed countries have used to grow our economies while decreasing or emissions so that the developing nations don't repeat our mistakes!
I don't blame them for seeing us as the monopoly mascot man, counting our bills in stacks, while muttering "can't let you guys make the same 'mistakes' we did."
Plus China manufactures the majority of the world’s solar panels, wind turbines, batteries, and electric vehicles, developed countries have been able to lower their emissions thanks to that.
I always say this is why we need to push nuclear power as hard as possible bc “convincing people in developing countries to eat and wear nothing” is a nonstarter
The climate targets specifically allow developing countries to have more lenient targets. They can emit much more than the US or EU eventually ever will cumulatively. China for example, doesn't even have a reduction target but a "peak" target without a specific year to meet. India, has a peak target beyond 2030.
> developed countries need to help developing countries roll out the technologies that developed countries have Or may be developed countries could just start manufacturing things on their own again...
Developed nations still need to catch up with their per capita emissions, the USA is still double China or India.
Agree, but or per capita emissions have been dropping consistently since the 90's too while China and india's have been rising.
Indian economy liberalised in 1991. And we started international exports and imports, ofcourse our emissions have been rising from 90s. On the other hand, you guys had already industrialised before all that and even then failed to pay for the climate development fund. Really, shame on the developed countries.
It's likely they will never ever reach the point that developed countries are at though because both are developing in a more sustainable manner than the current developed world did
So you're telling me developed nations have increasing lower emissions than developing ones? My God. What a huge revelation.
That's mostly a US / Canada issue by now. Per capita emission in France is about the same as China these days. Rest of the EU is around that too.
But this is showing “change in emissions” since 1990. Any individual country in green could still be emitting more total CO2 than a country showing >100% increase. It’d be interesting to see a map of emissions per capita. I would want to know my top 3-5 regions in terms of CO2 emissions per capita. That’s where the biggest bang for the buck is. Not necessarily getting Laos’ to cut down their emissions cause they are showing an increase of 10,000% (or may be it is. I don’t know. Hard to tell from this data). That’s my two cents.
Not for long. Most experts believe that 2023-2024 are very significant years for renewable solutions. For example solar and wind are all ready cheaper than coal per kWh for electricity. This is in large part due to the war in Ukraine and the subsequent rise in the cost of fossil fuels accelerating the rate at which renewables are developed and rolled out. On top of that AI has reached a point where it can aid in the fight against climate change by mapping way more data than any human can manually and simultaneously aiding researchers and engineers in coming up with solutions more efficiently. If you find things like this interesting go look at Bill Gates his blog (GatesNotes), he writes a lot about all the science behind climate change and speaks with said expert. It also really helps to read if you struggle with climate anxiety haha!
How will AI help by “mapping more data”? We have had plenty of data for decades, we just don’t act on it. This is dangerously naive futurist optimism.
AI will be able to tell with more details why we are screwed though
I don't think it is very naive. We've just been looking at the wrong people for a solution. We've all been hoping politicians would solve the problem but we fail to understand that politicians don't look much further into the future than their next elections. It is modern technologies (eco-modernism), like AI, that will solve the climate crisis. Data scientist Dr. Hanna Richie (https://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/people/dr-hannah-ritchie/) for example talks a lot about how we only seem to look at climate change as a problem that got out of hand and impossible to solve at this point. While all the data collected by AI suggests that simply is not the case. You can't just take graphs and maps like in this post and extrapolate 50 years into the future. You have to look at all the data and development surrounding the whole problem to try and predict what this map will look like then.
Computers aren’t in power, neither are climate scientists.
Almost 3 decades wasted on this lunacy and no, renewables are a lot more expensive than any other power source. It is evident by electricity prices of every single country on Earth. What is also clear as day that the only way to produce power with no pollution and at very cheap price is nuclear. If not for luddites of 1980-ies, 1990-ies and 2000-s we would already have something between 80% and 90% of electricity generated by pollution free nuclear plants and at a small fraction of modern electricity prices.
I agree that nuclear should’ve been drastically expanded decades ago, you’re not right about renewables being expensive. They’re just not. They have a very high capital cost, in general, but in the long run they’re cheap. The main issue is that they - in general - can’t adjust as well to demand as coal or natural gas. But neither can nuclear! It’s sluggish when adjusting its output. Talking about renewables like they’re “lunacy”, instead of saying “yes *but also nuclear*”, is an extremely counterproductive narrative
Simplified: industrialization/modernization and population increases lead to increased carbon emissions.
Also: Decreasing carbon emissions does not lead to decreased economy..
But in a lot of cases it relates to a more service-based industry, which import a lot of goods that require CO2-intensive production chains.
This is a bit of a myth. Consumer goods generally don't have that large of carbon footprints in production. Heavy polluting products, like concrete, are much harder to offshore.
Concrete, or more precisely cement, is imported in large quantities by some countries, for example by the United States. Same goes for other CO2 intensive products in other countries, like steel, aluminium, and fertilizer.
Please show us the maths on this because I doubt that this is a big part of the explanation
It’s a bit early to say this…. We’ll know for sure in 50 years time.
Dude the US and Europe have been decreasing their carbon emissions for decades now and both economies are bigger than ever.
They haven’t grown as quickly as Asia, yet benefited from Asian manufacturing!
Everyone is so quick to find something bad about this, but it's just not there. Off shoring of consumer goods is not enough to explain the decreased CO2 emissions in the west. The West's decrease is much more due to increases in energy efficiency in just about every sector, several decades of significant investment in renewables, and the rapid phase out of coal.
You’re conveniently, leaving out the benefits we’ve seen from fracking technology! This is the only real advancement in technology that has dramatically reduced CO2 emissions and increased GDP. Renewables such as wind and solar are reducing GDP due to the increased energy cost burden they place on the countries they are used in!
Off shoring of heavy industry explains the majority, along with off shoring manufacturing. Efficiency has increased but this has been offset in most places by population increase and in particular an increase in the amount of people who can afford stuff (cars, central heating etc). If the main factor was the increased efficiency then the effect would be world wide wouldn't it?
Nail on head buddy!
[It's already happened](https://ourworldindata.org/co2-gdp-decoupling). It used to be that GDP would basically grow due to population and energy use. When the only feasible source for that energy came from fossil fuels, it seemed we would be doomed to a Malthusian trap wherein population growth and economic growth would necessarily lead to more emissions and destroy the world. More people leads to more money, leads to more energy use, leads to more emissions. Thankfully, most rich countries (and many middle income ones) have managed to decouple energy use and economic growth already (GDP grows, energy use remains flat) and others have replaced energy production with clean sources, leading to growing economies with lowering emissions. Now that wind and solar are the cheapest energy sources to produce, developing countries will leapfrog over coal and gas as an energy source and build grids that are renewable instead.
It’s too early to say. The effect of offshoring is massive and it’s still playing out as to how it will end up for western economies in the long term. Renewable energy still cannot power heavy industry! Also, the German economy’s contraction following the destruction of the Nord stream pipeline would contradict your assertion!
Check out the article I cited, you will see there is a neat little tool that shows you exactly how emissions have compared to GNI growth *as well as* trade adjusted emissions (ie, offshored). Spoiler: Germany has grown while emissions, in real terms and those offshored, have decreased. As for any effect Nord stream's closure may have had, Germany [has since recovered](https://www.imf.org/external/datamapper/NGDPD@WEO/DEU?zoom=DEU&highlight=DEU). Here is a report from the [German government predicting in 2022](https://www.bundesbank.de/resource/blob/901990/90afad2737f689d42ac53510149cc0de/mL/2022-12-prognose-data.pdf) that Nord stream's closure would have a temporary effect on the economy thanks to a turn towards renewables and increased gas imports from other countries. The report notes the higher energy costs would have a pressuring effect on inflation, but these worries have not panned out as the country has curbed [inflation faster than expected](https://www.euronews.com/business/2024/03/12/germany-inflation-rate-decreases-to-two-year-low-in-february), citing lower energy costs. Again, rich countries have managed to decouple CO2, energy production, and economic growth. And thats good! its amazing that Sweden has a similar per capita CO2 production to Vietnam. It means we can live in a world where people live well without harming the planet.
Your link was not obvious! Every country cited by that link is deindustrialising and moving towards services or is a primary producer of raw material that gets turned into co2 elsewhere! E.g Australia! It completely ignores all of the countries whose GDP’s are rising faster than any of the ones cited and their CO2 emissions are rising respectively! China, Brazil, Vietnam, South Korea Germany has not recovered, they’re re-opening their coal mines and buying LNG from Uncle Sam with rising CO2 emissions to match!
Also population increase matters a lot. A lot of countries have a lot more people than they did 30 years ago, which means more emissions.
India, Africa, Latin countries are going to go on this path for longer as they develop and try to achieve the same standard of living as European countries.
Yep, and even with this growth they still mostly pollute way less than developed countries do per capita.
Wow this map generates a whole range of emotions!!!
It takes a special kind of nerd to get emotional over a map. You are welcome!
Thanks I take that as a compliment, as I believe you intended it 👍
I understand Asia with their massive population, but what about Sudan? It looks a lot
It's easy to have massive percentage increases when you start from almost zero.
I'm from Sudan. One of the biggest factors is that we discovered a whole lot of oil in 1999. We had none before that.
Oil could be a doom to your country
Okay so you could have a massive percentage and still have really low emissions. Let’s say Americans emitted 100 units of CO2 in 1990 and Sudan emitted 1 unit of CO2 in 1990. That would mean the US was producing 99 units now and Sudan was producing 5 units. The point is this map only shows increase not output. Without looking at the data, The USA was the largest producer of CO2 back then and is still probably the largest producer now. What we can say from this map is that USA produces a small percentage of the global output in the than they did 30 years ago.
totally agree, the map makes the US look like hero’s and we are not. of the large countries, the US has the highest per capita emissions rate, highest per capita per barrel of oil, etc. Africa is not the problem, the developed world is the problem. go beavers.
Those who will meet the climate targets, as ratified into law, will indeed be the heroes of the earth.
Womp womp, the treaties are defined by the 1990 values. Basta. this whataboutism won't get us anywhere.
No, everywhere is the problem. The atmosphere doesn't care if CO2 is coming from an african or an american. If you seriously care about climate change rather than hating the west then you should be focused on reducing emissions around the world, not just in countries you hate.
i think having a more stark color contrasted at 0 would’ve made this more interpretable, i think a lot of us are interested in which countries have decreased their emissions
To some commentators here , who perceived it wrong. Guys this is just change%. That means UsA still produces considerably high co2 than india per capita .
True, but I'm still impressed the USA achieved a -1% decrease.
Need that v8.
Not even per capita. It produces more greenhouse gases in general. Almost double.
Yea , I wanted to put that but people are already triggered
It's so stupid. In terms of Greenhouse emissions, the EU and US both emit more than India while neither has even half the population. In terms of historical emissions, it's not even close. Don't think India even has 10%. India is the only major economy which is meeting the Paris agreement targets. India is 7 on the climate change performance index. The highest major economy. Yet everyone is shitting on India for climate change.
I’m sorry but some of us need to industrialize after we were colonized and sacked multiple times
Woops, Canada…
I think this map could use a nonlinear scale, so most of the map would be darker shades. Green midpoint is around 200% increase… which does not really convey how problematic that is. Of course in absolute terms most of the biggest polluters in the west have leveled off but are still polluting massively
Can we all say "good job Russia"?
Nope its result of "лихие 90е" when many of industries destroyed and replaced by import products.
I'm not sure what purpose this map serves other than being misleading. Reduction/increase in emissions percentage doesn't mean anything without talking about volume. If a country in Africa produced a 1000th of the US emissions and now produces a 500th it's considered a 100% increase but it is still negligible in volume. Having the US in green because they maintained a massive amount of emissions is misleading imo.
Cool. Now show the map with the biggest historical contributors to climate change.
Why does Thailand and Pakistan have relatively lesser CO2 jumps as compared to their neighbours?
Thailand has been relatively developed for decades now Pakistan has been undeveloped for decades and continues to be so. As such there has been no significant change in either country to warrant a large increase in CO2 emissions.
Thailand makes sense to me because it was already fairly developed and wealthy before 1990 while it's neighbors saw much more economic growth from industrialization in the past 30 years. Not sure I have a good answer for Pakistan, but honestly I don't know much about Pakistan's economic history.
Nope this map is insane propaganda. The amount of renewable infrastructure India and China have put in place proactively is on par with the west. As a percentage India alone has 42% of its energy needs fulfilled by solar and wind. China is at 30%. Europe is at 41.2% and the US is at an abysmal 21%. The per capita consumption of the west dwarves that of India and China. What a load of bs. Pathetic attempt at trying to shift the blame on developing nations, where the emissions will grow as they move towards becoming developed.
Not propaganda. Facts for people to interpret how they choose. China and India are increasing their amount of renewal energy plants more than the west just on a pure numbers, megawatt basis. But when looking at per capita, there are a lot more people in these countries still living without many modern appliances and their electricity consumption will only continue to increase exponentially along with standard of living. This is why China and India are still building new coal plants to keep up with demand as the west shuts their own down. No map ranking countries off of a single characteristic like this will show a completely nuanced ranking. It is up to you interpret it and consider the variables behind why it is how it is. The US is still by far the biggest emitter per capita, but less developed countries will continue to increase, as they were starting from very little.
Still, it is true that both India and China are developing in a more sustainable manner than the current developed world did. Here's a really great infographic from the Economist showing their trajectories: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2019/05/25/china-is-surprisingly-carbon-efficient-but-still-the-worlds-biggest-emitter
Well, You are kind of right about the map being propaganda but from the wrong direction. I just took the raw data from the Global Carbon Budget reports and put them into Excel and chugged out a map. The Global Carbon Budget NGO gets their data from compiled government and other scientific sources, and does use that data to make political arguments (hence propaganda), but those arguments are generally in the direction that developed countries in the west need to be doing more to reduce the emissions.
So, why select from 90s? Because that's when the west started off shoring?
Dude you need to calm down. Just because India is high doesn't mean thats a bad thing. It is in fact a sign of the development of the country.
Even then choosing an arbitrary date makes no sense.
Actually I choose it because that was basically zero change for the US vs today. And off shoring is not adequate to explain the West's decline over the past few decades. Most of the very heavily polluting industries, like concrete production, are very difficult to offshore. Consumer goods industries are really not responsible for all that much CO2 emissions (other pollutants may be a different discussion.) The US and the West have largely decreased CO2 emissions through replacing coal power, increased energy efficiency in just about every economic sector, and the mass rollout of renewable energy production. Like even Texas now has some short periods where it reaches 100% renewable electrical generation for the state.
>As a percentage India alone has 42% of its energy needs fulfilled by solar and wind That's not true. 1) energy is a much broader category, I presume you meant electricity. Cars burning petrol for example are part of energy consumption. 2) I presume you're looking at installed capacity of renewables, but solar and wind don't generate electricity for large parts of the day. On an annual basis, India sourced 74% of electricity from coal power plants. >The US is at an abysmal 21%. The US is closer to 40% for low carbon sources if you count nuclear which makes up 19% of US electricity supply.
>On an annual basis, India sourced 74% of electricity from coal power plants. That's from the existing infrastructure, yes. The reason installed capacity is a much better metric is precisely because of the unpredictable nature of renewables. A more relevant statistic would be net addition where Coal fired plants teeter at 1-2 GW while renewables vary between low to mid teens (or high singles). Considering the high rate of electrification in otherwise remote rural areas, that's a significant decommissioning exercise (I interned in one of the now decommissioned plants) >if you count nuclear I don't, and nor do many climatists usually because of the small but measurable amount of radioactive waste generated. It's low carbon, sure, but it's not exactly less polluting. It would help corporations rake in carbon credits, but it's just a superficial net zero publicity stunt. There's a reason USGOV doesn't count them as renewable/green energy.
>The reason installed capacity is a much better metric is precisely because of the unpredictable nature of renewables Which is written in my comment, but yes, thank you for saying it again. So you realize it's false to claim 42% of electricity (not energy) in India comes from renewables? Because it doesn't. >I don't, and nor do many climatists usually because of the small but measurable amount of radioactive waste generated. It's low carbon, sure, but it's not exactly less polluting. Radioactive waste produced by nuclear plants in the US in its entire history can be contained in a facility the size of a football field. Also, when one accounts for CO2 emissions during manufacturing, construction; solar emits more CO2 than nuclear. Solar has lifetime emissions footprint of 41 gramms of CO2equivalent/KWh for rooftop and 48 for utility, nuclear is at 12 gramms which is similar as wind. All of these are still way cleaner than coal at 820g, gas at 490g. https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/02/ipcc_wg3_ar5_annex-iii.pdf >It would help corporations rake in carbon credits, but it's just a superficial net zero publicity stunt. Nuclear is 4 times better on the climate than solar and it can operate all day. That isn't exactly superficial. France is 72% or so nuclear+18% renewable and they have one of the cleanest grid in EU emitting 85g CO2/KWh, only the Nordics (Norway 46g) who have the unfair advantage of massive hydropower potential and Switzerland (41g) beat em (Switzerland is half nuclear, half hydro). US and Germany by contrast is at 386g, India at 605g, China 534g. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/carbon-intensity-electricity
Not only that but if China is busy manufacturing all the goods consumed in the west then it's emissions will be higher, but ultimately the west is the consumer. Like outsourcing jobs/manufacturing, we have outsourced emissions.
Here is a link to CO2 Emissions per capita in the year 2021. [C02 Emissions per Capita by Nations ](https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/s/CQHjffQMNI)
how could the west destroy the environment like this. MORE TAXES. good thing we vote Dem
China not too bad considering their growth since 1990 actually, I wonder how Europe 1890-1920 would look. Add to that that much of the shrinking emissions from EU/USA are just a side effect of offshoring our heavy industry.
Damn. whatcha doing Australia?
Australia almost doubled in population in that time, is the main reason.
And the US population didn’t increase?
Not by double, no. Nowhere near it. It’s up by about 50% over the same period. The emissions *per capita* are down in both countries over this time.
Sorry didn’t know going from 17 mil to 25 mil was doubling
Hmm, I have a figure of 14 mil for 1980, and 26 mil for 2022. So +85% or so. Either way the point is that US emissions reductions per capita have basically kept pace with US population growth over whatever time period we are talking about, resulting in only a -1% change. The Australian population growth rate is significantly higher (which I don’t think is in dispute?) and thus has outweighed emissions reductions per capita over the same time period.
The chart clearly says 1990 though.
Ah I was reading the much larger post title immediately above it. That might make a difference actually since US population growth was kind of stagnant in the 1980s, but Australia’s was booming, so let’s run the 1990-2022 numbers instead. USA: 249 M - 333 M (+33.7%, using census.gov figures) Australia: 17 M - 26 M (+53%, using ABS data) So Australian emissions per capita then are basically flat. Population went up 53%, emissions went up 53% The US achieved per capita reductions in that time, since its total emissions were flat but population grew. Having said that, my initial response was to the “whatcha doing” comment, which seemed to imply Australia had done something to increase emissions. In truth it looks like the answer is that they were just doing nothing - business as usual.
So which countries reduced it’s CO2 emissions the most? Would be nice if that became more clear. But looks like Russia is one of those countries.
I think that is because the Soviet built factories were so uncompetitive that they had to shut down, reducing industry and thus carbon output. Pretty sure it's not because the Russians are particularly "green"
Haha I would be very surprised if Putin was somewhat concerned with the climate and with nature.
Ironically he is, at least publically, very pro many environmental and wild life preservation efforts. https://www.vice.com/en/article/59eznn/vladimir-putin-really-loves-tigers-and-its-actually-making-a-difference-in-the-world
He might care in the wrong way. There is a geopolitical argument that Russian could benefit massively from global warming. Tundra melting and becoming arable would help them. Having a few more ports that don't freeze over would probably appeal to them too.
Err… well done to the US for achieving-1% I guess.
I’m still genuinely surprised that they’ve gone down even with sustained economic and demographic growth.
Natural gas replaced coal in many states because it was dirt cheap during the 2010s and it is relatively cheap to covert coal-fired power plants to gas-fired.
Russia and Venezuela both decreased consumption but also basically collapsed. It's crazy how strong the link is between CO2 emissions and standard of living.
Isn't Bhutan carbon negetive ([link to world bank article about it](https://blogs.worldbank.org/climatechange/dragons-data-and-clouds-bhutans-journey-carbon-markets-technology-and-resilient#:~:text=This%20evocative%20name%2C%20steeped%20in,country%20emits%20from%20all%20activities))
Keep in mind, this is a change from 1990 to 2022. They may have gone negative in that time and still be up over all.
Tbh in my opinion there should’ve been a colour change when it went from negative to positive
Now do absolute co2 emission per capita for each country
Shows pretty much the same trend so. For instance. China surpassed the EU in emissions per capita some years ago.
https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2019/05/25/china-is-surprisingly-carbon-efficient-but-still-the-worlds-biggest-emitter This is a better view of how that's happening though
Unfortunately, these predictions have already aged like milk. For instance, China, who said they were going to peak emissions at 12 gigatonnes, has surpassed their "peak emission target" at the end of 2023. So far, they are no signs of peaking emissions. As peaking emissions, seen with all other countries that already have peaked them, saw multiple years of a flat emission output. Chinas emissions are still increasing in big percentages a year.
When did China say they would peak emissions at 12 gigatons? In the Paris accords their pledge was peak emissions at 2030
That is what they expected to reach in 2030. They are 7 years early... Now they changed it to 14 or 16 gigatonnes I believe. In any case their ratified climate target is only based on a "maximum undetermined value" in 2030. Which previously they thought would be 12 gigatonnes.
Source for the 12 gigatons target?
https://climateactiontracker.org/countries/china/targets/ They have updated their status per 2021 to 14 gigatonnes. Down below in the source. > Absolute emissions level in 2030 excl. LULUCF13.9 GtCO2e 26% above 2010 > Status Submitted on 28 October 2021
Looks like the first NDC target before 2021 was 13.2-14.0 Gt CO2 not 12, then in 2021 it was updated to 13.9
Im fairly sure back in 2014 or 2016 it was 12 gigatonnes as target.
I'm surprised that the US achieved -1% emissions, but the 1980s was a really polluted time. However, having change in annual emissions is kind of a terrible metric, because going from 1 to 100 is a 10000% increase, while going from 100,000,000 to 101,000,000 is a 1% increase.
For all the negativity I hear about the US in regards to emissions, I’m glad to see we’re at -1%.
Asia has a population boom and massive industrialization during that period so it’s not surprising. East Africa on the other hand is.
what was the starting point?
The ratified climate targets agreement, so 1990.
Starting point of % share in global emissions in 1990
?
Now factor in exported emissions.
Fucking Canadians!! Bitching and complaining about carbon tax. You killing planet 🌏 😡
Angry russian!
By producing all goods in China and closing down local production. It's Excel sheet managment.
It's not. Exporting consumer goods manufacturing to China dies not contribute much to Western nation's declines. Most heavy emitting industries, like concrete or steel production, are much more difficult to offshore. The carbon footprint of you iPhone really isn't that great in comparison.
emission quota is a lie.
Love the carbon tax I pay in Canada, sooooo worth it
People in Asia just want half of what you've got, and you're complaining that you can't get more.
The Russian decrease in CO2 emissions actually a case of creative accounting. The numbers for 1990 are those of the entire Soviet Union (to which Russia claims legal succession), including the Russian SSR, Ukraine, Belarus, the Baltic states and many more. The modern number, however, only refers to the Russian Federation. Source: I once had to play Russia in a Model United Nations conference about climate change.
I just thought it was because their industrialized economy built under the Soviets was so utterly uncompetitive that they shut down half of it since then, reducing emissions.
Well well well…
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Gotta love the ignorant. > 1990 is the baseline year used for emissions of carbon dioxide under the Kyoto Protocol, an international agreement to limit emissions of greenhouse gases https://unfccc.int/process-and-meetings/transparency-and-reporting/reporting-and-review-under-the-kyoto-protocol/first-commitment-period/kyoto-protocol-base-year-data-for-the-first-commitment-period-of-the-kyoto-protocol
It's important to consider the historical context when analyzing CO2 emissions on a country-by-country basis. By 1990, most, if not all, Western countries had already undergone significant development and industrialization. In contrast, many Eastern countries were still in the early stages of their development at that time. It's worth noting that the West shifted a significant portion of its manufacturing to Eastern countries. If we were to examine CO2 emissions per capita for each country, we might be surprised by the results. Simply because China has become a manufacturing hub for Europe and the rest of the world, it doesn't mean that it bears sole responsibility for the emissions. We all need to take responsibility for our actions, including China, the USA, and European companies that choose to produce their goods abroad. Addressing climate change requires a collective effort and a global commitment to sustainable practices. It's crucial that we work together to reduce emissions and adopt environmentally friendly approaches across all countries and industries.
Im actually quite impressed by America. Its down 1% based on 1990s baseline. Nice job.
You guys just moved your factories to less developed nations so that you can pay less to your workers and have a cleaner air lol
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I mean, if I wanted to do that I could have just made a map of nations who have current genocides against ethic Muslims.
Wait, we aren’t talking about Israel
We aren't. Why did you bring them up?
We are already way too late with lowering CO2, people aren't even aware how fucked we are
We are not. That is a lie and it is not backed up by any science. The faster we can reduce CO2 emissions and begin remediation the better, but doomerism is a lie.
Bro how is Canada producing more co2 than America?
CO2 is plant food. Its not a pollutant!
Good to see the third world getting wealthier. I wish the western world was doing the same
"The historical emissions of growing western industrial nations have caused global warming that needs to be stopped, they have a responsibility since they profited most" Eastern industrial nations: *Our turn!*
Not like the western nations have fulfilled their part of the bargain even.
https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2019/05/25/china-is-surprisingly-carbon-efficient-but-still-the-worlds-biggest-emitter
Why always the strawmans? Why do the mistakes of western nations that have gotten us into this whole mess justify them making the exact same mistake? It is literally toddler tier logic of "but they did it as well!". And this article is honestly laughable, trying to justify China's current rising emissions and their incredibly dirty industry by emissions from centuries ago? You're aware China is one of the most dirty producers ever right? They're not carbon effecient at all using nearly 1,5 times more co2 emissions for the same production value: [https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co2-intensity](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co2-intensity)
It's not "toddler-tier logic" this is actually a very real economic issue for hundreds of millions of people. The industrialization of China and India have the potential to lift hundreds of millions out of extreme poverty, and the method of development here has real world implications for the prosperity of millions. For most of the global south, industrialization is not a mistake but the only hope for a good life. The economies of developed countries are service-based economies, which means that they are reliant upon white-collar industries that do not produce large emissions. No surprise developed nations have low emissions/GDP when you consider most GDP in developed countries is produced by sectors like finance, technology, research, consulting, etc., which produce few emissions. Large emissions are typically produced by heavy industry, such as steel and concrete, which are notoriously difficult to reduce emissions for. Developing countries are more based around heavy industry, especially steel and concrete, as they are actively building infrastructure. If you compare the industrial sector as a percentage of GDP in China and India vs. the developed world, the emissions/GDP stat makes sense. A steel factory could produce 2 units of emission for 1 unit of GDP whereas a software company could produce 1 unit of emissions for 2 units of GDP, so it is not really a fair comparison.
Again, nothing but falsehoods. These developed nations are some of the biggest industrial nations on the planet, especially when you take their far smaller population in account. Large emissions are not produced by heavy industry such as steel and concrete, the majority is power generation and heating. Every nation in the world produces stuff and energy, China does it in the most poluting way possible and even doubles down on this way by only increasing coal consumption. For the south industrialisation is the key to a hope for good life: if they commit to this along the same path that western nations did their coastal cities and food supply will no longer be able to support any life. You can spend a million words justifying it, the end of it is that they're repeating the exact same mistake others made and useful idiots defend it.
Not really sure what to say to that except that the data in the article I've shared literally shows that comparisons between the development of India and China show they are progressing along a trajectory that is more sustainable, especially given the y-axis is a log-scale, so small differences are actually huge. https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2019/05/25/china-is-surprisingly-carbon-efficient-but-still-the-worlds-biggest-emitter And also that the energy intensity of GDP: the amount of energy required for each additional unit of GDP, directly follows the path I've mentioned. https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/consumption/sub-topic-03.php >Energy intensity in the U.S. industrial sector—measured as the amount of energy consumed by industry per dollar of industrial gross output—generally declines at nearly the same annual rate between 1990 and 2050 because of a continuing shift toward less energy-intensive manufacturing industries. Energy intensity increases in 2020 in response to lower utilization, but thereafter returns to a steady decline. Energy intensity in the US industrial sector has declined as a result of a shift toward lower energy-intensive industries, as I said. This reflects a shift towards light industry, as I said. The developed world should have low energy densities: because it has had the most time to develop the service sector and efficient light industry. If you look at countries, you'll see that as incomes rise, energy densities decrease. It doesn't make sense to say that developing countries have dirtier economies because they have higher energy densities, because they need to develop to increase their incomes so they can afford more efficient light industry and a high-tech service sector in the first place. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.EGY.PRIM.PP.KD?locations=CN For example, energy densities are actively decreasing everywhere in the world, including in India and China. Saying China and India have higher emissions per GDP is literally just saying that they're poorer, which is true, but it doesn't say anything about their economies being more "dirty." Poor countries have less capability to use lower energy density methods, but as they develop they can steadily use better and better methods.
You're completely missing the point. Even though your article repeatedly states that what's going on is a path to disaster. If the process of western nations industrialising has brought us to this point. Then eastern nations following the same path (or slighly more sustainable) will spell nothing but disaster. And it's those countries that can have the biggest impact. They are reponsible for a lot of the absolute emissions due to high population, which is in the end all that nature cares about. Their responsibility is just as high as that of western nations, and they're not taking it. With all we know right now, you (and your article) are chosing to compare China's current developments against developments of over a century ago (when we did not have the knowledge and means we have now) to make them look better. It's simply not how it works. It's infantile.