Global carbon dioxide emissions decline by 7 percent in 2020
The global emission of carbon dioxide has come down by seven per cent this year due to the lockdown caused by the Coronavirus, which is the highest ever. According to the study published on Thursday in the journal ‘Earth System Science Data’, the ‘Global Carbon Project’, the official group of a dozen scientists monitoring emissions, has calculated that in 2020, 34 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions into the world will happen. This is lower than in 2019 when air emissions of 36.4 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide occurred.
Scientists said that the main reason for this decrease was that people stayed in homes, traveled less by car and plane. They expressed apprehension that carbon dioxide emissions would increase after the pandemic was over. It makes up about one-fifth of carbon dioxide emissions from land transport.
Climate scientist Corinne Le Quéré at the University of East Anglia said that lockdown is not the way to deal with climate change. A few months ago, scientists from the same group had predicted that emissions could be reduced by four to seven per cent and depend on the Covid-19 epidemic.
Le Quéré said that a second wave of corona virus and travel restrictions have resulted in a seven percent drop in emissions. She said that in the US, emissions have decreased by 12 percent, while in Europe there has been a reduction of 11 percent. But China saw a 1.7 percent drop in emissions. This is because the lockdown was first imposed in China and the second wave was less there.
Corinne said China’s emissions are more industry-based and its industry is less affected than that of transportation. This calculation has been done on the basis of energy use and industrial products etc. However, in 2020, on average, the world releases 1075 metric tons of carbon dioxide into the air every second.
