The International Energy Agency (IEA) has published an analysis showing that the global carbon dioxide emissions caused by burning fossil fuels stalled in 2015 in comparison to previous year, and that happened the second year in a row. For two years, CO2 emissions trend is decoupled from the economic growth trend.
In 2015, global CO2 emissions reached 32.1 billion tons and haven’t significantly changed since 2013. Preliminary data from IEA show that production of electricity from renewables played a significant role. New power plants commissioned in 2015 mostly use renewable sources of energy. There was a significant number of new wind power plants commissioned in 2015. Global economy recorded more than 3% growth in 2015.
In more than 40 years of CO2 measurements, the International Energy Agency has recorded only four periods when the emissions stalled or even dropped in comparison to previous year. These periods occurred in early 1980s, 1992 and 2009, and were related to global economic crisis. Current stagnation of emissions, however, happens during economic growth. In 2015, CO2 emissions dropped mainly in China and the U.S. (the biggest CO2 producers in the world).
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