UK’s ‘hidden’ carbon emissions fail to show the bigger picture.

It’s one of the Government’s proudest boasts. Britain, it claims, has almost halved its greenhouse gas emissions from 800m tonnes in 1990 to just 417m tonnes in 2022.

It’s a staggering decrease – a faster decline than almost any other advanced nation. And it is a fact that is used regularly by politicians to trumpet the UK’s progress.

“We’re far ahead of every other country in the world,” Rishi Sunak said in September. “We’ve had the fastest reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in the G7. Down almost 50pc since 1990. France? 22pc. The US? No change at all. China? Up by over 300pc.” The Telegraph has the story.

But can a nation whose population has grown by several million in the past two decades, with each citizen consuming more than ever, really have cut emissions by such a massive amount?

Part of the answer to that question lies in the databases of Leeds University where the UK’s official “consumption emissions” figures – the statistical elephant in the room – are compiled by a team led by Professor John Barrett.

When politicians say that emissions have fallen to 400m tonnes, they are referring to the greenhouse gases emitted within Britain’s borders, from power stations, cars, homes, offices and what’s left of industry. These are known as territorial – or production – emissions.

What they exclude is everything else, meaning all foreign-produced cars, clothes, food and every other import as well as the shipping that imports those goods into the UK, and most of the aviation fuel burned for passenger flights.

These overseas emissions used to be relatively small, but as the UK’s own industries have shrunk, they have become an ever-increasing proportion of the overall carbon footprint.

In 1990, overseas emissions totalled less than 200m tonnes of CO2 emissions per year. Since then the UK’s increasing reliance on imports means overseas emissions totalled 350m to 400m tonnes.

Last year the UK exported goods worth £393bn according to government data. However, Britain imported goods worth £581bn, resulting in an excess of £189bn. 

“Within a couple of years, greenhouse gas emissions associated with UK consumption will result in more emissions outside the UK than inside the UK,” says Leeds University’s Barrett. “Emissions embodied in imports will be more than the total territorial emissions in the UK.”

In real terms it means that, in addition to the 400m or so tonnes of CO2 pouring from Britain’s homes, vehicles and remaining smokestacks, there are another 350m to 400m tonnes being produced on the UK’s behalf but in other countries. If you add those two figures together and make an adjustment for the UK’s exports, you get Britain’s overall carbon footprint – its consumption emissions – which now total around 750m to 800m tonnes.

It is a marked fall from 1990 when the UK’s consumption emissions totalled 1bn tonnes but nowhere near the 50pc cut claimed by Mr Sunak last year. 

“We have provided the Government with the UK’s consumption-based emissions data for many years,” says Barrett. “However, it is rarely or never quoted when statements are made about emission reduction. I believe it should be. Both approaches are needed.”

Energy consumption figures give an answer as to why the UK’s own CO2 emissions have sunk so rapidly. In 2022, the country used less energy from all sources including coal, gas and renewables than in any year since 1970. 

Read the full story here.