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America’s carbon dioxide emissions rose by 3.4 percent in 2018, the biggest increase in eight years, according to a preliminary estimate published Tuesday.
In 1974, the economist William Nordhaus described the transition from a “cowboy economy” to a “spaceship economy.” In the former, he wrote, “we could afford to use our resources profligately,” and “the environment could be used as a sink without becoming fouled.” But, in the spaceship economy, “great attention must be paid to the sources of life and to the dumps where our refuse is piled.”
The warnings around climate change now have additional data backing them up: carbon dioxide emissions in the U.S. were up last year.
The news comes after the EU-funded Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) concluded that 2018 was Earth’s 4th-warmest on record, with the past 4 years serving as the planet’s hottest seen since instrument records began in 1880 (and likely well before that).
Coal is declining, but natural gas is growing.
The uptick follows several years of relatively flat emissions, underscoring the urgency of climate action.
On the campaign trail and as president, Donald Trump has expressed his skepticism about global warming. So it was a bit of a surprise when a reader asked us to check a statement issued by his Environmental Protection Agency that touted the administration’s record in reducing emissions of greenhouse gases, which scientists say are the main driver of global warming.