Chinese emissions could swamp efforts to stop global warming
October 23rd, 2008 by Jim JustA new study by Chinese researchers China’s emissions will tower over all others’ much sooner and higher than previously thought.
By 2020, China’s burning of fossil fuels could annually emit carbon dioxide equal in mass to 2.5 billion metric tonnes of pure carbon and up to 2.9 billion tonnes, depending on varying scenarios for development and technology, the new report states. By 2030, those annual emissions may reach 3.1 billion tonnes a year and up to 4.0 billion tonnes.
That compares with global carbon emissions of about 8.5 billion tonnes in 2007. Emissions are also often estimated in tonnes of Co2, which weighs 3.67 times as much as carbon alone.
The think-tank report does not give its own estimate of China’s current Co2 emissions, but cites data from a US Department of Energy institute that put them at 1.4 billion tonnes of carbon in 2004.