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| Data Source: ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2/trends/co2_mm_mlo.txt |
The UK has been emitting significant amounts of carbon dioxide since the early 1800's. Since the 1950's the amount of Solid Carbon Dioxide emissions in the United Kingdom have been slowly declining. In 1950 the UK was releasing 136 million metric tons of solid carbon, and in 2010 they had reduced their solid carbon emissions to 32 million metric tons of solid carbon. While the amount of solid carbon emissions have gone down since the 1950's gas and liquid emissions have each gone up by about 50 million metric tons. The total carbon emissions are slowly going down, and I believe this is due to the Climate Change Act of 2008. This act requires the UK to start lowering their carbon dioxide emission levels by 80% of the level it was at in 1990.
Per capita the UK emits less carbon dioxide than the U.S. The U.S. emits 4.7 metric tons per person while the UK only emits 2.16 metric tons per person. This means the UK only emits 46% of the amount of carbon as the U.S. I think one of the reasons the UK doesn't emit as much as the U.S. is because they are so much smaller in area. If the UK was the size of the United States and produced the same amount of carbon dioxide per square mile as they are now, they would be emitting more carbon dioxide than the U.S. The United States is currently ranked 12th in the world for CO2 emissions per capita, and the UK is ranked 47th. I am very surprised about the United States rank as well as the UK's rank. I would have thought that both countries would be higher up on the list. I was surprised to see what countries were in the top 10.
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| Data Source: http://cdiac.ornl.gov/CO2_Emission/timeseries/national |
Compared to China, the United States, and even India, the UK has had a fairly steady rate of CO2 emission. Just looking at the amounts of CO2 emissions from the UK the numbers seem outrageous, however when you compare the United Kingdom to the U.S. and China their emission levels seem small. From the graph it looks like the Unites States was the biggest emitter of CO2 up until around 2000 when China surpassed the United States. If you look at emissions on a per capita basis an American Citizen would be more at fault for emitting CO2. We are emitting 4.7 metric tons per person, and China is about 1.68 metric tons per person.
If we take a look at the total amount of carbon emitted per country over time we get these numbers:
United States: 94,225,770 (Thousand Metric Tons)
Kenya: 86,840 (Thousand Metric Tons)
Italy: 5,579,562 (Thousand Metric Tons)
India:10,229,326 (Thousand Metric Tons)
China: 36,152,061 (Thousand Metric Tons)
According to these results the United States is responsible for the most amount of carbon emission, however with the rate that China is now emitting, I don't think it will be long until they pass the United States in total emissions.
Over all China has emitted only 39% the amount of CO2 that the US has, and India has only emitted 11% the amount of CO2 that the US has. Even adding all of China's CO2 and India's CO2 emission levels together they are only half the amount of the United States.
The Keeling Curve graph and the Total Fossil Fuel Emissions graph are similar in the sense that they are both increasing. The Keeling curve graph is the CO2 concentration parts per million while the Fossil Fuel graph is in thousands of metric tons. Since they are measuring different things and the unites are different, I think it is difficult to compare the two. Other than the fact that they are both increasing and that is not a good thing.
