Europe’s greenhouse gas output down over 8% in a year
The EU’s climate commissioner has seized on a sharp fall in emissions across the bloc as evidence that climate action is not incompatible with economic growth, as he prepares for the major UN climate summit in Azerbaijan next month.
“As we head off soon to COP29, we once again demonstrate to our international partners that it is possible to take climate action and invest in growing our economy at the same time,” Wopke Hoekstra said as the European Commission published the 2024 edition of its annual EU Climate Action Progress Report.
The headline figure was an 8.3% drop in greenhouse gas emissions, a fall not seen since the anomaly of 2020, when covid pandemic lockdowns combined with mild weather to reduce carbon output by 9.8%, followed by a rapid rebound.
While emissions in Europe are now 37% below the baseline year of 1990, the union is still a long way from its 2030 target of net reduction of at least 55%.
The drop, based on preliminary data from national governments, brings the EU’s annual carbon footprint measured in CO2 equivalent to just 6% of a global total of 53 billion tonnes a year – a record figure that represents a 1.9% increase on 2022 worldwide.
“Sadly, the report also shows that our work must continue, at home and abroad, as we are seeing the harm that climate change is causing our citizens,” added Hoekstra, who will head the EU’s negotiating team in the Azeri capital Baku, where the COP29 opens on 11 November.
The fall in emissions is distributed highly unevenly across sectors. The power stations and factories that must pay for each tonne of CO2 they emit under EU emissions trading scheme have seen CO2 equivalent output fall by over 47% since it came into effect in 2005.
Emissions linked to buildings,