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Several rich countries have decoupled GDP growth from emissions
Most have done so without outsourcing their carbon footprint
EVERY YEAR, carbon dioxide (CO2) is pumped into the atmosphere from dirty combustion and power plants. Over the past two centuries, more than 1trn tonnes of greenhouse gases have caused the Earth’s temperature to rise. Dramatic reductions in emissions are needed to limit global warming. It looks at last as though this might be happening. A recent report from the Global Carbon Project, a research organisation, found that over the past decade global CO2 emissions have started to reach a plateau.
Though many poorer countries such as China and India have increased their carbon emissions in the last ten years, this has been roughly balanced by reductions in emissions from America and much of Europe. In total 76 countries have reduced their CO2 output per person by more than 5% since 2010. In the past decade these countries have collectively reduced their yearly carbon emissions by around 1.4 gigatonnes, more than the CO2 output of the whole of Africa in 2019.
Although increasing emissions have historically gone hand-in-hand with economic growth, several rich countries are now bucking this trend. In two dozen countries, including America, Britain and France, GDP per person has increased since 2010 while carbon emissions have fallen.
This has not come about merely through a shift of production—and hence pollution—to other countries. Most of the countries that experienced GDP growth along with a decline in CO2 emissions also decreased their average citizen’s consumption of CO2, which takes into account pollutants produced at home, plus any trade emissions—those associated with a country’s imports of goods and services, minus the CO2 produced from exports (see chart). Some countries, such as America, Denmark and Switzerland, did have a slight increase in their net trade emissions per person, but this was drastically outweighed by reductions at home.
Still, there is a long way to go if the world is to prevent catastrophic global warming. Even if emissions in these 24 emission-reducing countries continue to fall at the same rate, it would take more than 80 years for them to reach zero. ■
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