A new tool that tracks worldwide Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions threatens to unmask the false figures being offered by many governments, which may not be declaring the real amounts of pollutants that are emitted into the atmosphere. It also offers detailed data on the main polluting industries in Spain.
It is the digital platform Climate Trace, promoted by former US Vice President Al Gore, who took advantage to unveil it at the COP27 in Egypt. The first thing that Climate Trace has revealed is really disturbing: the real emissions that are being released into the atmosphere are approximately three times higher than what those responsible for them declare.
In the case of Spain, on this website there is a complete list of GHG emitting points, detailing location, nature of the facilities, amount of emissions amongst other data. There is also a breakdown by type of gas and industrial activity, and comparisons can be made with other countries around the world. In total, there are 260 sources accounted for in our country.
In this other link, it is possible to see it in map form, both of Spain or of the whole planet, which offers a global vision of the magnitude of the problem of the emissions.
Climate Trace makes it possible to measure the real levels of CO2 and other greenhouse gases as soon as they are emitted, thanks to current technology enabled by satellites and other information and artificial intelligence systems. This avoids, for the first time, having to rely on data provided by the countries themselves, which do not always declare the real figures and tend to underestimate emissions.
This new system, which has been endorsed by the UN, monitors emissions from 72,000 individual sites around the world , including all types of facilities in industry, energy, transport, cities, ports and airports. As expected, oil and gas fields and production facilities are the main sources of pollutant emissions.
The initiative has come from a conglomerate of laboratories and research entities, companies and NGOs, but has also been financed by Google. Al Gore has stated that ‘the emissions data currently available are not detailed enough to be used for decision making’.
In fact, in the specific case of Saudi Arabia, it has been found that there is a large difference between the emissions declared by its government and those that have been empirically measured by the new system. “The emissions are greater than those that have been declared,” said Gore, who in statements to The Guardian said that Climate Trace will serve to “protect against the cheating” that some world leaders or companies in the sector still do when it comes to reporting emissions.
Spain, the 33rd highest in emissions
In the case of Spain, Climate Trace identifies, one by one, the main sources of emissions into the atmosphere, including factories and industries of all kinds (cement plants, above all), but also airports, ports and agricultural and livestock farms.
The Mediterranean coast, the north and the center seem to account for Spain, in the world ranking of greenhouse gas emitters, ranks 33rd in a list of 240 states. Our country causes 0.55% of all global emissions on the planet.
The largest global emitter continues to be China, which accounts for 28% of all gases emitted annually into the atmosphere, followed by the United States, with 11.4%; India, with 6.9% and Russia, with 6% of the total.
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Environment section contact: crisisclimatica@prensaiberica.es
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