According to a report released by the International Monetary Fund recently, global carbon emissions began to recover from 2017 after a steady decline of several years after 2009. The report calls for reducing carbon emissions if climate change is to be slowed down.

According to the report, global carbon emissions increased by 1% in 2017 and another 2% in 2018. In recent years, China's carbon emissions have been decreasing year by year due to the increased investment in renewable energy, and economic growth has become more dependent on services rather than manufacturing. In India and other emerging market economies, carbon emissions are increasing. In 2018, except for the United States, the carbon emissions of all G7 economies decreased. The increase in carbon emissions in the United States is due to the recovery of industrial production and may also be due to bad weather.

IMF pointed out that in the past five years, the decrease of energy intensity (i.e. energy use per unit of GDP) and carbon intensity (i.e. carbon emissions per unit of energy) has been conducive to the growth of carbon emission reduction. However, in 2018, the contribution of energy intensity to emission reduction decreased, which may be due to the cyclical recovery of global industrial production. As a result, the decline of energy intensity and carbon intensity cannot offset the growth of population and global per capita income, especially the recovery of per capita income in 2017 and 2018, leading to the increase of carbon emissions.

Source: China Environmental News