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Compiled daily
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If everyone lived like this
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CO₂ per person since 1950
Fossil fuels and cement. The dashed line adds the CO₂ released abroad to make the goods a country imports, and takes out what it exports (from 1990).
Where it comes from
CO₂ per person in the latest year, by fuel. Coal, oil and gas are burned for power, heat, transport and industry; cement releases CO₂ when limestone is heated.
Every country, per person
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| # | Country | Tonnes of CO₂ per person | Against the world average |
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Show all — countries
| # | Country | Tonnes of CO₂ per person | Against the world average |
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What can one person change?
Tonnes of greenhouse gases saved per person per year in rich countries, by one choice, as estimated by Wynes and Nicholas (2017) from 148 scenarios in 39 studies. Averages: the real saving depends on the country, the household and what replaces the choice.
Where the emissions come from
- Animal farming →The food slice of the footprint: emissions from meat, dairy and feed.
- Deforestation →Forest clearing and other land use roughly quadruple Brazil’s emissions per person.
- EU carbon price →What polluters in Europe pay per tonne of CO₂.
Where the heat goes
- Heatwaves →Hotter, more frequent heat in the world’s cities.
- Ocean heat →The ocean has taken up about 90% of the extra heat.
- Tipping points →What could change for good as warming passes 1.5 °C.
How we know this
- Source: Our World in Data’s CO₂ and greenhouse gas dataset, which republishes the Global Carbon Budget 2025 (CO₂ from fossil fuels, cement and land use, and CO₂ in traded goods) and Jones et al. (2025) for all greenhouse gases and each country’s share of the warming.
- Update cadence: yearly; the Global Carbon Budget is published each November. We check every night and download the file only when it changes.
- Methods: “per person” divides a country’s emissions by its population. The what-if multiplies the per-person CO₂ by the world’s population and adds today’s CO₂ from land use, then divides the 170 billion tonnes left for 1.5 °C (Global Carbon Budget 2025) by the result.
- Uncertainty: fossil CO₂ is known to within about 5% worldwide, less well for some countries; land-use CO₂ and other gases are much less certain. Imported-goods estimates come from trade models and lag a year behind.
- Limitations: a country average hides large differences between rich and poor households, and includes industry, freight and public services, not only what people do at home.
- Primary data: Our World in Data · Global Carbon Budget · How this page is built