Photo: Malaysian palm trees
The Washington Post reports a giant gap between the greenhouse gas emissions nations are reporting to the UN and their actual numbers. There were at least 8.4 billion tons and as much as 13.3 billion tons in underreported emissions. At the low end, the gap is larger than the yearly emissions of the U.S. At the high end, it approaches those of China and comprises 23% of humanity’s total contribution to the planet’s warming. The gap relates to questionably drawn rules, incomplete reporting in some countries, and apparently willful mistakes in others plus that in some cases humanity’s full impacts on the planet are not even required to be reported. Malaysia, for example, released 422 million tons of greenhouse gases in 2016, placing it among the world’s top 25 emitters that year. But because Malaysia claims its trees are consuming vast amounts of CO2, its reported emissions to the UN are just 81 million tons. So the challenge of reigning in emissions is even larger than world leaders have acknowledged.
www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/interactive/2021/greenhouse-gas-emissions-pledges-data/?itid=hp_Climate%20box