Carbon Emissions

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change what volume of carbon dioxide emissions has been recorded in the UK on an environmental accounts basis in each year since 1990. (320331)

I have been asked to reply.

The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the authority to reply.

Letter from Stephen Penneck, dated March 2010:

As Director General for the Office for National Statistics, I have been asked to reply to your Parliamentary Question asking what volume carbon dioxide emissions has been recorded in the UK on an environmental accounts basis in each year since 1990 (320331).

Estimates of air emissions, including carbon dioxide, are published annually by ONS as part of the Environmental Accounts.

The ONS Environmental Accounts measure greenhouse gas emissions on a UK resident basis, in order to be comparable with National Accounts economic data. Therefore, they include emissions generated by UK residents in the UK and emissions from UK residents' transport and travel activities abroad. They exclude emissions generated by non-residents' transport and travel in the UK.

As such, these data are on a different basis from estimates published by the Department for Energy and Climate Change under the UK's Kyoto Protocol obligations. The Kyoto Protocol basis covers emissions from UK territory only and excludes emissions from international aviation and shipping.

The most recent publication was on 12 June 2009 and statistics on carbon dioxide emissions for the period 1990-2007 are available on the National Statistics website at the following address:

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/statbase/Expodata/Spreadsheets/D5695.xls

The table in the annex presents the weight of carbon dioxide emissions created between 1990 and 2007 on a UK Environmental Accounts basis.