Right, went to the doctors and guess what, they actually had something interesting to read in the waiting room. I could make up a story about how it was the Guardian and that I read about how established economies have large – but declining – carbon emissions. While the new economic giants are growing rapidly. But we all know that isn’t true (the bit about finding a copy of the Guardian in the Doctor’s surgery) – just like global warming isn’t true, right?!

(image by Liz|Populational courtesy of Flickr – CC BY 2.0)

Anyway, some 2009 World Carbon emissions data culled from the Guardian highlighting the potential for dubiety in statistical reporting:

On pure emissions alone, the key points are:

• China emits more CO2 than the US and Canada put together – up by 171% since the year 2000
• The US has had declining CO2 for two years running, the last time the US had declining CO2 for 3 years running was in the 1980s
• The UK is down one place to tenth on the list, 8% on the year. The country is now behind Iran, South Korea, Japan and Germany
• India is now the world’s third biggest emitter of CO2 – pushing Russia into fourth place
• The biggest decrease from 2008-2009 is Ukraine – down 28%. The biggest increase is the Cook Islands – up 66.7%

However that is only one way to look at the data – and it doesn’t take account of how many people live in each country. If you look at per capita emissions, a different picture emerges where:

• Some of the world’s smallest countries and islands emit the most per person – the highest being Gibraltar with 152 tonnes per person
• The US is still number one in terms of per capita emissions among the big economies – with 18 tonnes emitted per person
• China, by contrast, emits under six tonnes per person, India only 1.38
• For comparison, the whole world emits 4.49 tonnes per person

Futher details are available from the Guardian’s DataBlog article:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/jan/31/world-carbon-dioxide-emissions-country-data-co2.

Project-wise, we’ve modelled sample data via the STEEV Mapping Demonstrator (previous blog post). We’re arranging for Steve Lannon (Welsh School of Architectire, Cardiff University) to demonstrate the EEP model in order for project staff to gain a familiarity with the processes and energy efficiency variables generated which will feedback into back-end data storage and modelling. Steve then aims to run the model, apply policy scenarios and deliver further tranches of variables with which we can then fine tune WMS-T aspects. We intend to get this work under way in next couple of weeks (bearing in mind the Easter break) so watch this space as they say!

By the way, the interesting read in the doctor’s surgery was an old Oor Wullie book – as commonplace as some religious texts in working class Scottish households!