plate 279 · 2024 data

Estonia cut carbon per person more than any growing economy

Change in fossil CO2 per person vs real GDP growth, 2014–2024, 153 countries with 1 million+ people.

A planet under pressure
  1. 1. Heat that bleaches coral reached 84% of the world's reefs
  2. 2. Swiss glaciers lost over 5% of their ice in 2026
  3. 3. Canada's 2023 fires burned more than twice the old record
  4. 4. Tropical forests lost a record 6.7 million hectares in 2024
  5. 5. Drought cut Panama Canal transits by a fifth in 2024
  6. 6. China adds more forest each year than any other country
  7. 7. Kyoto's cherries now bloom earliest in 1,200 years of records
  8. 8. Brazil's Amazon lost the least forest on record
  9. 9. Three in four Bangkok residents now live on a floodplain
  10. 10. Indonesia now emits more CO2 from energy than Germany
  11. 11. Iran's gas flaring has doubled in ten years
  12. 12. Grid gas SF6 is building up at a record pace
  13. 13. Syria has lost more stored water than drought-famous Iran
  14. 14. Guyana now emits more CO2 per person than Britain
  15. 15. Nearly 20 million Shanghai residents live in a flood zone
  16. 16. Indonesia climbed from tenth to fourth in CO2 from coal
  17. 17. Brazil's Amazon north added 85% of its new cattle
  18. 18. Estonia cut carbon per person more than any growing economy
−58%

Estonia's fossil CO2 per person fell from 14.3 t in 2014 to 5.95 t in 2024 while its economy grew 22.7%.

−39%

Finland had the next-biggest fall (8.7 t to 5.3 t) among the 142 countries whose economies grew.

67

Of 142 growing economies, 67 cut fossil CO2 per person, though across all 153 faster growth usually came with faster-rising emissions.

Source: Global Carbon Project, Global Carbon Budget 2026 (fossil CO2 per person) + IMF World Economic Outlook, October 2026 (real GDP growth), 2024
the numbers & method

Claim types Fact · Interpretation

Fossil CO2 per person: Global Carbon Project, Global Carbon Budget fossil CO2 dataset 2026v11 (Zenodo 10.5281/zenodo.23667912), tonnes CO2 per person; real GDP growth: IMF World Economic Outlook, October 2026 (NGDP_RPCH, annual %). Both read from the publishers' files and API via the progrss vault (GUIDELINES §4.11; live re-read failed: web access refused this run). GDP growth 2014–2024 is the annual growth rates 2015–2024 chained (progrss calculation). Countries with 1 million+ people (World Bank WDI SP.POP.TOTL, 2024) and all ten growth years (153). Estonia 14.29 t (2014) → 5.95 t (2024), −58.4%; GDP +22.7%; 2025 preliminary 5.61 t. Next-largest falls among the 142 countries whose GDP grew: Finland −38.9% (8.72 → 5.32 t), Angola −37.2%, DR Congo −34.8%, Denmark −32.1%, United Kingdom −32.1%. Correlation across 153 countries: Pearson r 0.41, Spearman 0.54; dropping any one country gives r 0.40 to 0.44. Restricted to the 97 countries starting between 0.5 and 15 t with growth between −20% and +100% (ceiling/floor test): r 0.44, Spearman 0.52. Laos (+358%), Cambodia (+254%) and the Central African Republic (+193%), all from small bases, are in the statistics but off the chart. A link, not a cause (progrss calculation). The data does not say why Estonia's emissions fell (cause not drawn). Of the 142 countries whose economies grew, 67 cut fossil CO2 per person (progrss calculation).

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