The data on carbon emissions in 2023 is only just in, but we can already predict where things will go this year.
Global greenhouse pollution hit a new record and increased 1.1% last year, the International Energy Agency reported recently. That was almost entirely a China story. Had the country held its carbon budget steady — or reduced it, in the manner of fellow high-income countries whose pollution is now at a 50-year low — then the world’s climate footprint would have shrunk by about 155 million metric tons, instead of growing by 410 million tons.
If you want to know how this year is shaping up, Beijing’s National People’s Congress provided a sneak peek. Its recently announced 5% growth target doesn’t absolutely guarantee that global emissions will rise again in 2024. But it makes the path to avoiding that fate extraordinarily narrow.