Australia still emits more greenhouse gas from burning coal on a per capita basis than other G20 countries despite a significant rise in solar and wind energy.
While Australia and South Korea have cut per person emissions from coal-fired electricity since 2015 – by 26% and 10% respectively – they continue to release more CO2 than other major economies, according to an analysis by the energy thinktank Ember.
China – the world’s biggest annual emitter in absolute terms – ranks third after its per capita emissions from coal power rose by 30% over seven years due to its growth in electricity use outpacing its growth in zero-emissions generation. It has installed 670 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity - about a third of the world’s solar and wind – since 2015.
The Ember analysis, released before a G20 leaders’ summit in India starting on Saturday, said Australia used twice as much electricity as China on a per capita basis, and 48% of it came from coal plants.
It was down from 64% in 2015 after an influx of solar and wind energy. But Australia’s per capita emissions from coal last year were more than four times the global average.
Dave Jones, Ember’s global insights lead, said China and India – as emerging countries that are home to about a third of the world’s people – were often accused of being the world’s big coal polluters, but the report showed Australia and South Korea were worse once population was factored in.
“As mature economies, they should be scaling up renewable electricity ambitiously and confidently enough to enable coal to be phased out by 2030,” Jones said.
The report said Australia selling its vast coal reserves overseas meant it was also “an enabler for other countries in becoming polluters”. The country is the world’s second biggest coal exporter after Indonesia.
Domestically, Australia’s main electricity grid, covering the five east coast states, gets about 35% of electricity from renewable energy. The Albanese government has set a target of reaching 82% by 2030, though experts say this is in doubt at the current pace of clean energy and transmission investment.
The government has attempted to address this through several electricity announcements, including confirming support for major electricity storage and transmission projects despite cost blowouts, and underwriting new renewable energy developments “firmed” with storage.
Globally, about 36% of electricity generation last year came from burning coal. It produced 8.4bn tonnes of CO2.
The Ember report suggested global renewable energy capacity needed to triple by 2030 to keep limiting global heating 1.5C within reach – a key goal of international agreements on the climate crisis.
It said this was feasible but would require robust policy, secure supply chains, effective integration of solar and wind into energy grids and more deployment in emerging economies, in particular. “This in turn will help drive and accelerate the phase down of coal and other fossil fuels,” the thinktank said.
The G20 is responsible for about 80% of global emissions. G20 energy ministers failed to reach a consensus on phasing down fossil fuels and tripling renewable energy capacity this decade at a preliminary meeting in July after objections from some producer nations. Saudi Arabia, Russia, China, South Africa and Indonesia are all said to oppose that scale of clean energy expansion by 2030.
Ember found 12 of the 20 major economies had recorded a drop in per capita emissions since 2015. The biggest fall was in the UK, which was down 93%.
But across the full G20 per person emissions from coal plants increased by 9%. The G20 average is 1.6 tonnes of CO2 per person a year. The global average is 1.1 tonnes.
At least 75 countries, including Australia, have committed to either phasing out coal or not building new coal plants without contentious carbon capture technology. But seven G20 nations – Brazil, China, India, Japan, South Korea, South Africa, and the US – have not released coal phase-down strategies.
