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U.A.E., Australia, U.S. Are Worst CO2 Polluters, Maplecroft Says
2010-11-17 00:01:00.3 GMT
By Alex Morales
Nov. 17 (Bloomberg) -- The United Arab Emirates, Australia
and the U.S. are the worst carbon polluters, where businesses
are most in danger of facing pressure to cut greenhouse gas
emissions, the U.K. risk analysts Maplecroft said.
The U.A.E. dropped 15 places from the previous year to take
over from Australia as the worst-performing nation, Bath, U.K.-
based Maplecroft said today in an e-mailed statement. That's
because its overall emissions from burning fossil fuels rose by
a quarter from 2006 to 2008, when data was used to calculate the
current index, the analyst said.
Canada, the Netherlands and Saudi Arabia joined those three
nations as the six considered at "extreme" risk of facing
pressure or regulations to slash emissions of heat-trapping
gases, according to the index of 183 countries. Businesses in
Russia, Germany, the U.K., France and China all face a "high"
risk while Chad was categorized as the least in danger.
"As the world moves toward a low carbon economy, more
rigorous environmental policies may leave companies exposed to
costly operating expenses and new investment requirements,"
Maplecroft's head of indices, Fiona Place, said in the
statement. "Energy-intensive sectors, such as the extractive
sector and logistics, will be particularly vulnerable."
National emissions per capita in 2008, the most recent year
of data, take up 50 percent of the weighting in Maplecroft's
index while cumulative emissions since 1900 and greenhouse gas
output for 2008 accounted for 25 percent each of the ranking.
Rapid economic growth and an increase in sourcing water
from energy-intensive desalination plants led to the U.A.E.'s
sinking to the bottom of the table, Maplecroft said.
No Silver Bullet
Qatar had the greatest emissions per capita of the 183
nations at 74.1 metric tons of carbon dioxide followed by
Bahrain and the U.A.E. China, deemed the 26th worst polluter
overall, had the highest emissions in 2008, ahead of the U.S.,
Russia, India and Japan. The U.S. had the biggest cumulative
emissions followed by China, Russia, Germany and the U.K.
The study comes 12 days before United Nations climate
change talks begin in Cancun, Mexico. The negotiations
ultimately aim to produce a global deal to fight climate change
though Christiana Figueres, who leads the talks as executive
secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, has
said a "silver bullet" solution won't be found in Cancun and
that negotiators should aim for a package of measures on
forestry, finance and technology rather than a full treaty.
For Related News and Information:
Climate-change news: NI CLIMATE <GO>
Top environment page: TOP ENV <GO>
Most-read environmental stories: MNI ENV <GO>
Carbon emissions markets: EMIT <GO>
--Editors: Randall Hackley, Rob Verdonck
To contact the reporter on this story:
Alex Morales in London at +44-20-7330-7718 or
amorales2@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Reed Landberg at +44-20-7330-7862 or landberg@bloomberg.net.
