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> As noted in another comment, some of this can be attributed to manufacturing being done elsewhere and the UK becoming more of a service economy. This would

> As noted in another comment, some of this can be attributed to manufacturing being done elsewhere and the UK becoming more of a service economy. This would be an interesting metric... instead of carbon emissions being calculated by the location of "chimneys", a better metric would be a total carbon emissions by all consumpton of the country. Sure, EVs are clean if you buy them in (eg.) UK, but all the polution is done elsewhere, from the dirty lithium production and dirty rare earths production, energy intensive metalworks, etc., but the car is still bought and used in UK, and the UK consumer is the cause for those emissions. Also many even local policies don't take that in effect, because many things where we 'force' users into 'greener alternatives' are not so green if you count the manufacture (which is done elsewhere, and again, noone cares about that). In many cases, extending the life of a device (car, appliance,...), even with bad energy usage and/or emissions is still greener (looked globally) than buying a new appliance/car and disposing of the old. Sure,the new small EV is "green", but driving your old VW golf for 5 more years could have been greener (again, depends on the distance driven, etc.).

gambiting 3y ago
>>the UK consumer is the cause for those emissions. Sure, but counting it as UK emissions would mean you count it twice, no? If other countries that mine lithium report their own CO2 emissions then if you add the CO2 cost of using electronics made with lithium and used in UK to UK's CO2 emission, that means you have counted the same emissions twice,no?
- patmorgan23 3y ago
  If you are trying to total all CO2 admissions? Yes. If you're trying to determine which countries have the biggest impact it could be a valuable metric.
- mirekrusin 3y ago
  It needs to be done at planet level, otherwise it's emission shifting, not reduction. Moving it from one place to another on the same planet doesn't reduce emissions.
- kitbrennan 3y ago
  While there's a lot of nuance to this: in carbon accounting it is standard practice to account for the same emission more than once. Carbon inventories are broken out into three different scopes, the first two scopes concern fuel and electricity generation emissions, and the third scope includes everything in your value chain (both upstream and downstream). Therefore the country producing the EV battery would report on the emission in their Scope 1 and Scope 2 inventory, and the country utilising that EV battery would report it within their Scope 3 inventory. It may seem odd to double account, but the goal of carbon accounting is not to ascribe blame to an emission (since ascribing blame is a never-ending game of finger pointing), it is to make every business/consumer responsible. The country creating the emission needs to be incentivised to decarbonise, and the country consuming that emission needs to be incentivised to decarbonise their full - including international - supply chains.
  - gambiting 3y ago
    Ah - that's really interesting, didn't know this. But that means that UK should already be counting CO2 emissions of products sold there(where known), right?
    - kitbrennan 3y ago
      Yes, this is where the *nuance* mentioned at the start of my reply comes in. It *should* include all scopes, including upstream emissions from purchased goods and services from abroad. But in many countries their country-level carbon inventories still have huge gaps. UK Legislation implements the GHG Protocol scope system in the UK's carbon accounting regulations that businesses must follow for reporting their emissions (e.g. SECR), and government guidance for calculating emissions all follow the scope system too (e.g. BEIS Conversion Factors guidance). So it is very disappointing if the UK's carbon accounts has got gaps (but I wouldn't be surprised).
  - IMTDb 3y ago
    > It may seem odd to double account, but the goal of carbon accounting is not to ascribe blame to an emission It's definitely how it is used by activists / NGO etc tho [1]. Another strange practice is to scale the CO2 production with the price of goods. Eg: it is assumed that you produce 10x more CO2 when you buy a $100 bottle of wine than if you buy a $10 bottle of wine. This makes no sense at all from an environmental perspective, but the conclusion you can draw from this are aligned with the political views of the people producing those reports. 1: https://www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/stories/top-5-ways-billionaires-are-driving-climate-change/ https://www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/stories/top-5-ways-bill...
- abhaynayar 3y ago
  Ironically you have written "twice, no?" twice.
dan-robertson 3y ago
The search term you’re looking for is “consumption based emissions”. There the uk in 2021 was down >30% from its peak, though the number for this year may be lower. Example: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/consumption-co2-emissions?tab=chart&country=GBR~SWE~CHE~NOR https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/consumption-co2-emissions...
helsinkiandrew 3y ago
46% of 'British Peoples' carbon emissions are released overseas (2016) https://www.wwf.org.uk/sites/default/files/2020-04/FINAL-WWF-UK_Carbon_Footprint_Analysis_Report_March_2020%20%28003%29.pdf https://www.wwf.org.uk/sites/default/files/2020-04/FINAL-WWF... > In 2016, 54% of the UK’s carbon footprint was domestically sourced with the remaining 46% coming from emissions released overseas to satisfy UK consumption. The overseas proportion of the UK’s carbon footprint increased substantially – from just 14% in 1990 – thus reducing the scope of UK climate policy to affect emissions associated with consumption.
xorcist 3y ago
> if you count the manufacture (which is done elsewhere, and again, noone cares about that) Please stop feeding that myth. There is a lot of anti-green propaganda built on it. The area of research is called lifecycle analysis and is one of the most heavily studied recently, precisely because we need facts to base an energy transition on. There is plenty of published and reviewed research.

gambiting 3y ago

>>the UK consumer is the cause for those emissions. Sure, but counting it as UK emissions would mean you count it twice, no? If other countries that mine lithium report their own CO2 emissions then if you add the CO2 cost of using electronics made with lithium and used in UK to UK's CO2 emission, that means you have counted the same emissions twice,no?

patmorgan23 3y ago
If you are trying to total all CO2 admissions? Yes. If you're trying to determine which countries have the biggest impact it could be a valuable metric.
mirekrusin 3y ago
It needs to be done at planet level, otherwise it's emission shifting, not reduction. Moving it from one place to another on the same planet doesn't reduce emissions.
kitbrennan 3y ago
While there's a lot of nuance to this: in carbon accounting it is standard practice to account for the same emission more than once. Carbon inventories are broken out into three different scopes, the first two scopes concern fuel and electricity generation emissions, and the third scope includes everything in your value chain (both upstream and downstream). Therefore the country producing the EV battery would report on the emission in their Scope 1 and Scope 2 inventory, and the country utilising that EV battery would report it within their Scope 3 inventory. It may seem odd to double account, but the goal of carbon accounting is not to ascribe blame to an emission (since ascribing blame is a never-ending game of finger pointing), it is to make every business/consumer responsible. The country creating the emission needs to be incentivised to decarbonise, and the country consuming that emission needs to be incentivised to decarbonise their full - including international - supply chains.
- gambiting 3y ago
  Ah - that's really interesting, didn't know this. But that means that UK should already be counting CO2 emissions of products sold there(where known), right?
  - kitbrennan 3y ago
    Yes, this is where the *nuance* mentioned at the start of my reply comes in. It *should* include all scopes, including upstream emissions from purchased goods and services from abroad. But in many countries their country-level carbon inventories still have huge gaps. UK Legislation implements the GHG Protocol scope system in the UK's carbon accounting regulations that businesses must follow for reporting their emissions (e.g. SECR), and government guidance for calculating emissions all follow the scope system too (e.g. BEIS Conversion Factors guidance). So it is very disappointing if the UK's carbon accounts has got gaps (but I wouldn't be surprised).
- IMTDb 3y ago
  > It may seem odd to double account, but the goal of carbon accounting is not to ascribe blame to an emission It's definitely how it is used by activists / NGO etc tho [1]. Another strange practice is to scale the CO2 production with the price of goods. Eg: it is assumed that you produce 10x more CO2 when you buy a $100 bottle of wine than if you buy a $10 bottle of wine. This makes no sense at all from an environmental perspective, but the conclusion you can draw from this are aligned with the political views of the people producing those reports. 1: https://www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/stories/top-5-ways-billionaires-are-driving-climate-change/ https://www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/stories/top-5-ways-bill...
abhaynayar 3y ago
Ironically you have written "twice, no?" twice.

dan-robertson 3y ago

The search term you’re looking for is “consumption based emissions”. There the uk in 2021 was down >30% from its peak, though the number for this year may be lower. Example: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/consumption-co2-emissions?tab=chart&country=GBR~SWE~CHE~NOR https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/consumption-co2-emissions...

helsinkiandrew 3y ago

46% of 'British Peoples' carbon emissions are released overseas (2016) https://www.wwf.org.uk/sites/default/files/2020-04/FINAL-WWF-UK_Carbon_Footprint_Analysis_Report_March_2020%20%28003%29.pdf https://www.wwf.org.uk/sites/default/files/2020-04/FINAL-WWF... > In 2016, 54% of the UK’s carbon footprint was domestically sourced with the remaining 46% coming from emissions released overseas to satisfy UK consumption. The overseas proportion of the UK’s carbon footprint increased substantially – from just 14% in 1990 – thus reducing the scope of UK climate policy to affect emissions associated with consumption.

xorcist 3y ago

> if you count the manufacture (which is done elsewhere, and again, noone cares about that) Please stop feeding that myth. There is a lot of anti-green propaganda built on it. The area of research is called lifecycle analysis and is one of the most heavily studied recently, precisely because we need facts to base an energy transition on. There is plenty of published and reviewed research.