U.S. Top Greenhouse Gas Emitter, Counting Imports

The United States is by far the biggest greenhouse gas emitter ahead of China if consumers in rich nations are given responsibility for energy used to make imported goods, a researcher said on Wednesday.

But adjusting emissions according to the country where consumers of goods live swells emissions by developed nations, said Glen Peters, a researcher at the Center for International Climate and Environment Research in Oslo (CICERO).

"The ranking makes a lot of rich countries look worse and a lot of poor countries look better," he told Reuters.

In the ranking of 73 nations, Americans have the biggest annual "carbon footprint" at the equivalent of 29 tonnes of carbon dioxide per capita, ahead of Australians on 21 tonnes and Canadians on 20 tonnes.

"The U.S. is increasingly shifted toward a more service-based economy, importing more of its products from China," Peters said of the ranking, published online last month in the journal Environmental Science and Technology.Peters' rankings count emissions within each country, then add on imports and subtrace exports.

Developing nations such as China have sometimes suggested that rich nations should take more responsibility for imported emissions in sharing out the burden of curbs under a new U.N. climate treaty due to be agreed in Copenhagen in December.

SOURCE : REUTERS