CB BureauIn further bad news for the entire world, new research has found that greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions worldwide have been growing at an accelerating pace this year, with emissions expected to increase by 2.7 per cent. Last year, it grew by 1.6 per cent after plateauing in the three years prior to 2017. This is the exact opposite of what is needed if global warming is to be somewhat combated. The research was published by the Global Carbon Project, a group of 100 scientists from more than 50 academic and research institutions that focuses on and studies global emissions numbers. The report was launched at the COP24, the UN climate summit in Katowice, Poland.
The rise in emissions is attributed to growing number of cars on roads and continued use of coal and oil (the latter going up five years in a row). Not only are more cars being bought, they are also being driven for longer distances, offsetting gains from the increasing sales of electric vehicles. Another major factor is the increasing demand for coal in the growing economies of China and India. Renewable energy is becoming more common but hasn’t outpaced fossil fuels yet. Then there are the financial institutions who have invested more than $478 billion in the world’s top 120 coal-plant developers since the Paris Agreement was signed.
The upward trajectory of GHG emissions has been compared to a ‘speeding freight train’ and a catastrophic crash seems inevitable. Almost every country has contributed to this rise, India leading the way with a 6.3 per cent increase in emissions, followed by China at 4.7 per cent, and the US with 2.5 per cent. The EU is doing marginally better with no significant increase but this is after a decade of continuous falls. As per the report, China produces 27 per cent of global emissions, the US 15 per cent, the EU 10 per cent, and India 7 per cent.
At this rate, the worst consequences of climate change such as frequent food shortages, wildfires, coastal flooding, and population displacement can become a reality as soon as 2030. Professor Corinne Le Quéré at the University of East Anglia who led the research said, ‘The global rise in carbon emissions is worrying, because to deal with climate change they have to turn around and go to zero eventually. We are not seeing action in the way we really need to. This needs to change quickly.’