Contrary to expectations, CO ₂ emissions remained stable in 2019, although the economy grew by 2.9%

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has released data on global CO2 emissions last year and, contrary to preliminary estimates, remained at the same level as in 2018, with 33 gigatons, although the global economy grew by 2.9%.

During the celebration of the Climate Summit in Madrid, the NGO Global Carbon Project announced that CO2 emissions in 2019 had increased by 0.6% compared to 2018, a year in which they grew by 2.1%. This slowdown, in his view, was more in response to the slowdown in the economy than to policies against global warming. According to their calculations, greenhouse gas emissions will grow at a rate of 1% to 1.5% per year, unless drastic measures are taken to contain them.

However, today, the IEA has revealed that after two years of growth, CO2 emissions remained unchanged at 33 gigatons during 2019, thanks to the decrease in emissions from electricity generation in advanced economies caused by renewables (wind and solar), the substitution of coal for natural gas and the increase in atomic production. As a result, emissions from advanced economies have fallen back to late 1980s levels.

Other factors influencing the stabilization of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere were more benign weather in several countries and slower economic growth in some emerging markets.

In the EU they fall by 5%

Emissions in the EU, the undisputed leader against climate change, fell by 160 million tonnes – or 5% – driven by reductions in the energy sector. Natural gas produced more electricity than coal for the first time in history, while wind electricity almost caught up with coal-fired generation.

However, in absolute terms, the US recorded the largest decrease in emissions per country, with a fall of 2.9%, equivalent to 140 million tons; its CO2 ejection has been reduced by almost 1 gigaton since the peak reached in 2000, basically due to the boom in the exploitation of fracking and unconventional hirdrocarbons, which have displaced coal in the generation basket.

In Japan, CO2 fell by 45 million tons, or 4%, the fastest rate of decline since 2009, due to the production of nuclear reactors, which for two years have been progressively reactivated after the Fukushima accident.

Emissions in the rest of the world increased by about 400 million tons in 2019, with almost 80% of the increase coming from Countries in Asia, such as China or India. In both, CO2 from the electricity sector was also moderated by lower coal consumption, but CO2 from other sectors, such as transport, continued to grow.

“Now we have to work hard to make sure that 2019 is remembered as a definitive peak in global emissions, and not as another pause in growth,” said Fatih Birol, executive director of the IEA: “We have the energy technologies to do this, and we have to make use of all of them.”

Reduce emissions by a third by 2030

Birol will discuss these results tomorrow at a special event at the IEA headquarters in Paris with Poland’s energy and climate ministers, which hosted COP 24 in Katowice; Spain, which hosted COP 25 in Madrid, which will be attended by Teresa Ribera, Vice President of the Government; and the United Kingdom, which will host COP26 in Glasgow this year.

The IEA will publish a Special Report on the Global Energy Outlook in June, outlining how to reduce global energy-related carbon emissions by one third by 2030 and how to achieve longer-term climate goals.

Source: The Economist