Carbon Monitor, a near-real-time daily dataset of global CO2 emission from fossil fuel and cement production

Zhu Liu ,Steven J Davis ,Chenxi Lu ,Xinyu Dou ,Oliviér Boucher ,Jinjun Xue ,Piyu Ke ,Philippe Ciais ,Yilong Wang ,Taochun Sun ,François‐Marie Bréon ,Bo Zheng ,Katsumasa Tanaka ,Biqing Zhu ,Rui Guo ,Eulalie Boucher ,Runtao Guo ,Haiwang Zhong ,Zhu Deng ,Daan Cui ,F Chevallier

doi:10.1038/s41597-020-00708-7

Abstract

We constructed a near-real-time daily CO2 emission dataset, the Carbon Monitor, to monitor the variations in CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion and cement production since January 1, 2019, at the national level, with near-global coverage on a daily basis and the potential to be frequently updated. Daily CO2 emissions are estimated from a diverse range of activity data, including the hourly to daily electrical power generation data of 31 countries, monthly production data and production indices of industry processes of 62 countries/regions, and daily mobility data and mobility indices for the ground transportation of 416 cities worldwide. Individual flight location data and monthly data were utilized for aviation and maritime transportation sector estimates. In addition, monthly fuel consumption data corrected for the daily air temperature of 206 countries were used to estimate the emissions from commercial and residential buildings. This Carbon Monitor dataset manifests the dynamic nature of CO2 emissions through daily, weekly and seasonal variations as influenced by workdays and holidays, as well as by the unfolding impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Carbon Monitor near-real-time CO2 emission dataset shows a 8.8% decline in CO2 emissions globally from January 1st to June 30th in 2020 when compared with the same period in 2019 and detects a regrowth of CO2 emissions by late April, which is mainly attributed to the recovery of economic activities in China and a partial easing of lockdowns in other countries. This daily updated CO2 emission dataset could offer a range of opportunities for related scientific research and policy making.

Highlights

Background & SummaryThe main cause of global climate change is the excessive anthropogenic emission of CO2 to the atmosphere from geological carbon reservoirs, the combustion of fossil fuel and cement production
Given that the uncertainty of CO2 emissions from fossil fuel burning and cement production is generally below ±10%9,21,22 and the annual difference in emission factors is less than 2%17, the CO2 emissions can be estimated directly by estimating the absolute amount of and the relative change in activity over time
This method has been widely used for scientific products that update recent changes in CO2 emissions estimates[1,23,24,25], given that official and comprehensive CO2 national inventories reported by countries to the UNFCCC become available with a lag of two years for Annex-I countries and several years for non-Annex-I countries[4]

Summary

Background & Summary

The main cause of global climate change is the excessive anthropogenic emission of CO2 to the atmosphere from geological carbon reservoirs, the combustion of fossil fuel and cement production. Given that the uncertainty of CO2 emissions from fossil fuel burning and cement production is generally below ±10%9,21,22 and the annual difference in emission factors is less than 2%17, the CO2 emissions can be estimated directly by estimating the absolute amount of and the relative change in activity over time This method has been widely used for scientific products that update recent changes in CO2 emissions estimates[1,23,24,25], given that official and comprehensive CO2 national inventories reported by countries to the UNFCCC become available with a lag of two years for Annex-I countries and several years for non-Annex-I countries[4]. The countries/regions include China, India, the US, EU27 & UK, Russia, Japan, Brazil, and the rest of the world (ROW), as well as the emissions from international bunkers This dataset, known as Carbon Monitor (data available at https://carbonmonitor.org/), is separated into several key emission sectors: power sector (39% of total emissions), industrial production (28%), ground transport (19%), air transport (3%), ship transport (2%), and residential consumption (10%). To June 30th in 2020 when compared with the same period in 2019 (Fig. 2), and detects a regrowth of CO2 emissions by late April, which is mainly attributed to the recovery of economic activities in China and partial easing of lockdowns in other countries (for a more in-depth analysis of this topic, please see our recent related paper[28])

Methods

Findings

Code availability