Prime polluters

Subject – Environment

Context – COP-26 at Glasgow

Concept –

The world released 36.4 gigatonnes (Gt) of CO2 in 2019 — the last year for which global data for the GHG is available — in fossil fuel emissions and from the cement sector.
- Of this, China alone emitted 28 per cent of the GHG.
- Add the United States and the European Union-27 (minus the United Kingdom), and the countries account for 50 per cent of the world’s CO2 emissions.
- If we add Russia, Japan, UK, Canada and Australia, the share goes up to 62 per cent.
India, which is the fourth largest (third, if we do not account for EU-27 as a group), contributed some 2.62 Gt of CO2 in 2019 — compared to China’s 10.17 GtCO2 and US’s 5.28 GtCO2.
- It added 7 per cent to the world’s CO2 emissions in 2019.
The entire continent of Africa, with 17 per cent of the world’s population, contributed a mere 4 per cent to the emissions in 2019.
CO2 emissions are still directly linked to a country’s gross domestic product.