Research shows that Britain and the EU are only achieving international carbon targets because emissions have been “off-shored” to countries like China.
The UK’s Kyoto target is to cut its production of CO2 to 12.5% below 1990 levels. But figures in Policy Exchange’s new research confirm that Britain is actually consuming almost a third more CO2 than it was in 1990.
According to the official Kyoto-based figures, UK carbon production is down 3% between 1990 and 2006. For the EU as a whole, carbon production increased by just 3% between 1990 and 2006. But total carbon consumption shot up by 47%. In 2006 the United States and the European Union net imported a quantity of carbon embedded in imports per head (4-5 tonnes) similar to China’s total carbon consumption per head of around 5 tonnes per head.
