ENVIRONMENTAL INDICATORS

Climate change:

Greenhouse gas emissions

Sources:

UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Secretariat (see: http://unfccc.int).
UNSD/UNEP 2004 questionnaire on Environment statistics, Air section, marked with "*".
UN Population Division.

Footnotes:

Definitions & Technical notes:

In this table, greenhouse gases (GHG) refer to carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄) and nitrous oxide (N₂O). These three gases account for around 98% of the environmental pressure leading to climate change. Each of these gases has a potential to trap heat in the atmosphere: i.e. methane is 21 times more powerful as a GHG than CO₂, while N₂O is 310 times more powerful. In order to aggregate the three gases to give total emissions of GHG, the data were weighted according to these CO₂ equivalents, also known as Global Warming Potentials.

Data on greenhouse gas emissions are usually estimated according to international methodologies on the basis of national statistics on energy, industrial and agricultural production, waste management and land use, etc.

The best known and most widely used methodology is the 1996 Guidelines of the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) (see http://www.ipcc-nggip.iges.or.jp/public/gl/invs1.htm) which is the basis for reporting to the UNFCCC. The latest revision and update of this guideline is 2006 IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories (see http://www.ipcc-nggip.iges.or.jp/public/2006gl/index.htm).

Data Quality:

Countries should report their greenhouse gas emissions to UNFCCC according to the IPCC Guidelines. The quality of data is regularly checked by UNFCCC for the Annex 1 parties to the Convention that report annually. Non-Annex 1 countries do not report on a regular basis and their data are not subject to the same thorough checking. Data quality depends on the quality of statistics underlying the calculations or estimates and is usually the best for energy related emissions; for other sources, the data should be used with caution when comparing countries.

Policy Relevance:

The Earth’s average surface temperature rose by around 0.6°C during the 20th century and most scientific advisors to the world’s governments conclude that evidence is growing that most of the warming over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities, such as burning of fossil fuels and deforestation. The resulting increased energy in the weather system is already resulting in increased storms and rainfall in some areas, while others suffer drought. This is expected to increase in future, and while how fast and where this will happen is still controversial, there is consensus in the scientific community that the consequences may be serious. In 1992 the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, in Rio de Janeiro, adopted the Framework Convention on Climate Change as the basis for global political action.

As a result of this convention, commitments to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases were agreed in Kyoto in December 1997. The Kyoto Protocol, which entered into force on 16 February 2005, stipulates that Annex 1 Parties (mainly industrialised countries) shall individually or jointly reduce their aggregate emissions of a “basket” of six greenhouse gases to 5% below 1990 levels by the period 2008-2012.

In contrast to this political target the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) indicates the need for an immediate 50-70% reduction in global CO₂ emissions in order to stabilise global CO₂ concentrations at the 1990 level by 2100.

The World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD ) held in Johannesburg in 2002 made commitments towards the urgent and substantial increase in the use of renewable (non-carbon) energy sources as well as the setting-up of programmes leading to more sustainable consumption and production patterns, including a reduction in energy use.