Fossil-Fuel CO₂ Emissions from Africa

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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 twelve-fold since 1950 reaching 311 million metric tons of carbon in 2008, still less than the emissions for some single nations including Mainland China, the U.S., India, Russia, and Japan. Although per capita emissions in 2008, 0.32 metric tons of carbon, were three times those in Africa for 1950, they were still only 6.6% of the comparable value for North America. Emissions from all fuel sources have grown in the African region over time with liquid and solid fuels now each accounting for approximately 35% and gas fuels accounting for 16.9% of the regional total. 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 46% comes from Egypt, Algeria, 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 four African countries have per capita CO₂ emissions higher than the global average (1.3 metric ton of carbon per year): Libya (2.53), South Africa (2.39), the Seychelles (2.22), and Equatorial Guinea (1.99). Based on 2008 per capita emission rates, 28 of the 55 African nations for which data are available have per capita emission rates less than 0.1 metric ton of carbon per person per year.