Carbon Monitor CO2

Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from the use of fossil fuels and the production of cement are the main driving force of climate change. Carbon Monitor is an international initiative providing for the first time regularly updated, science-based estimates of daily CO2 emissions. The data reveal the drop and re-growth of emissions during the COVID-19 pandemics.

Carbon Monitor is a frequently-updated daily CO2 emission dataset, to monitor the variations of CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion and cement production since January 1st 2019 at national level with near-global coverage. Daily CO2 emissions are estimated from a diverse range of activity data, including: hourly to daily electrical power generation data of 29 countries, monthly production data and production indices of industry processes of 62 countries/regions, daily mobility data and mobility indices of road transportation of 416 cities worldwide. Individual flight location data and monthly data were utilised for aviation and maritime transportation sectors estimates. In addition, monthly fuel consumption data that corrected for daily air temperature of 206 countries were used for estimating the emissions from commercial and residential buildings. Carbon Monitor data show the dynamic nature of CO2 emissions through daily, weekly and seasonal variations as influenced by workdays and holidays, as well as the unfolding impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Carbon Monitor shows a 7.8% decline of CO2 emission globally from Jan 1st to Apr 30th in 2020 when compared with the same period in 2019, and detects a re-growth of CO2 emissions by late April mainly attributed to the recovery of economic activities in China and partial easing of lockdowns in other countries.

See: Liu, Z., Deng, Z., Davis, S.J. et al. Monitoring global carbon emissions in 2021. Nat Rev Earth Environ (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43017-022-00285-w