Global, Regional, and National CO₂ Emissions

AFRICA

Graphics Digital Data

What countries constitute Africa?

Trends

Africa's fossil-fuel CO₂ emissions are low in both absolute and per capita terms. Total emissions for Africa have increased 12.1-fold since 1950 reaching 314 million metric tons of carbon in 2004, still less than the emissions for some single nations including the U.S., Mainland China, Russia, India, and Japan. Although per capita emissions in 2004, 0.34 metric tons of carbon, were 3.1 times those in 1950, they were still only 6.1% of the comparable value for North America. Emissions from all fuel sources have grown in the African region over time with liquid fuels accounting for 44.2%, solid fuels accounting for 34.2%, and gas fuels accounting for 12.4%. A small number of nations are largely responsible for the African emissions from fossil fuels and cement production; South Africa accounts for 38% of the continental total, and another 49% of the CO₂ comes from Algeria, Egypt, Nigeria, Libya and Morocco combined. These are the only six countries on the continent with annual CO₂ emissions in excess of 10 million metric tons of carbon. Only five African countries have per capita CO₂ emissions higher than the global average (1.23 metric ton of carbon per year): Equatorial Guinea (2.86), South Africa (2.68), Libya (2.55), the Seychelles (1.84), and Algeria (1.50). Based on 2004 per capita emission rates, 28 of the 54 African nations for which data are available have per capita emissions less than 0.1 metric ton of carbon per person per year.