The amount of forest lost around the world has reduced by millions of hectares each year in recent decades, but countries are still off track to meet “important” deforestation targets.
These are the findings of the Global Forest Resources Assessment – a major new report from the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization – which says that an estimated 10.9m hectares (Mha) of land was deforested each year between 2015 and 2025.
This is almost 7Mha less than the amount of annual forest loss over 1990-2000.
Since 1990, the area of forest destroyed each year has halved in South America, although it still remains the region with the highest amount of deforestation.
Europe was the only region in the world where annual forest loss has increased since 1990.
Agriculture has historically been the leading cause of deforestation around the world, but the report notes that wildfires, climate change-fuelled extreme weather, insects and diseases increasingly pose a threat.
The Global Forest Resources Assessment is published every five years. The 2025 report compiles and analyses national forest data from almost every country in the world over 1990-2025.
Carbon Brief has picked out five key findings from the report around deforestation, carbon storage and the amount of forest held within protected areas around the world.
1. Rates of deforestation are declining around the world
Rates of annual deforestation, in thousands of hectares, in South America, Asia, Africa, North and Central America, Oceania and Europe over 1990-2000 (dark blue), 2000-15 (medium blue) and 2015-25 (light blue). Source: Global Forest Resources Assessment 2025
In total, around 489Mha of forest have been lost due to deforestation since 1990, the new report finds. Most of this – 88% – occurred in the tropics.
This breaks down to around 10.9Mha of forest lost each year between 2015 and 2025, a reduction compared to 13.6Mha of loss over 2000-15 and 17.6Mha over 1990-2000.
Deforestation refers to the clearing of a forest, typically to repurpose the land for agriculture or use the trees for wood.
The chart above shows that South America experiences the most forest loss each year, although annual deforestation levels have halved from 8.2Mha over 1990-2000 to 4.2Mha over 2015-25.
Annual deforestation in Asia also saw a sizable reduction, from 3.9Mha over 1990-2000 to 2Mha over 2015-25, the report says.
Europe had the lowest overall deforestation rates, but was also the only region to record an increase over the last 35 years, with deforestation rates growing from 126,000 hectares over 1990-2000 to 145,000 hectares in the past 10 years.
Despite the downward global trend, FAO chief Dr Qu Dongyu notes in the report’s foreword that the “world is not on track to meet important global forest targets”.
In 2021, more than 100 countries pledged to halt and reverse global deforestation by 2030. But deforestation rates in 2024 were 63% higher than the trajectory needed to meet this 2030 target, according to a recent report from civil society groups.
The goals of this pledge were formally recognised in a key text at the COP28 climate summit in Dubai in 2023, which “emphasise[d]” that halting and reversing deforestation and forest degradation by 2030 would be key to meeting climate goals.
2. Global net forest loss has more than halved since 1990
Forest area net change by country between 1990 and 2025, in hectares. Source: Global Forest Resources Assessment 2025
The new report finds that forests cover more than 4bn hectares of land, an area encompassing one-third of the planet’s land surface.
More than half of the world’s forested area is located in just five countries: Russia, Brazil, Canada, the US and China.
The map above shows that, overall, more forest is lost than gained each year around the world. There was 6.8Mha of forest growth over 2015-25, but 10.9Mha of forest lost.
The annual rate of this global net forest loss – the amount that deforestation has exceeded the amount regrown – has more than halved since 1990, dropping from 10.7Mha over 1990-2000 to 4.1Mha over 2015-25.
The report says this change was due to reduced deforestation in some countries and increased forest expansion in others. However, the rate of forest expansion has also slowed over time – from 9.9Mha per year in 2000-15 to 6.8Mha per year in 2015-25.
There are many driving factors behind continuing deforestation. Agriculture has historically been the leading cause of forest loss, but wildfire is increasingly posing a threat. Wildfires were the leading driver of tropical forest loss in 2024 for the first time on record, a Global Forest Watch report found earlier this year.
The new UN report says that an average of 261Mha of land was burned by fire each year over 2007-19. Around half of this area was forest. Around 80% of the forested land impacted by fires in 2019 was in the subtropics – areas located just outside tropical regions, such as parts of Argentina, the US and Australia.
The report notes that fire is widely used in land management practices, but uncontrolled fires can have “major negative impacts on people, ecosystems and climate”.
It adds that researchers gathered information on fires up as far as 2023, but chose to focus on 2007-19 due to a lack of more recent data for some countries.
A different report from an international team of scientists recently found that fires burned at least 370Mha of land – an area larger than India – between March 2024 and February 2025.
3. Many countries are hugely increasing their forest area
Top 10 countries for annual net gain (blue) and net loss (red) of forest area over 2015-25, in 1,000 hectares per year. Source: Global Forest Resources Assessment 2025
Globally, deforestation is declining, but the trend varies from country to country.
The chart above shows that some nations, such as China and Russia, added a lot more forest cover than they removed in the past decade through, for example, afforestation programmes.
But in other countries – particularly Brazil – the level of deforestation far surpasses the amount of forest re-grown.
Deforestation in Brazil dropped by almost one-third between 2023 and 2024, news outlet Brasil de Fato reported earlier this year, which was during the time Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took over as president. The new UN report finds that, on average, Brazil lost 2.9Mha of forest area each year over 2015-25, compared to 5.8Mha over 1990-2000.
Russia’s net gain of forest cover increased significantly since 1990 – growing from 80,400ha per year in 1990-2000 to 942,000ha per year in 2015-25.
In China, although it is also planting significant levels of forest, the forest level gained has dropped over time, from 2.2Mha per year in 2000-15 to 1.7Mha per year in 2015-25.
Levels of net forest gain in Canada also fell from 513,000ha per year in 2000-15 to 82,500ha per year in 2015-25.
In the US, the net forest growth trend reversed over the past decade – from 437,000ha per year of gain in 2000-15 to a net forest loss of 120,000ha per year from 2015 to 2025.
Oceania reversed a previously negative trend to gain 140,000ha of forests per year in the past decade, the report says. This was mainly due to changes in Australia, where previous losses of tens of thousands of hectares each year turned into an annual net gain of 105,000ha each year by 2015-25.
4. The world’s forests hold more than 700bn tonnes of carbon
Changes in forest carbon stock by region and subregion of the world over 1990-2025. Source: Global Forest Resources Assessment 2025
The “carbon stock” of a forest refers to how much carbon is stored in its trees and soils. Forests are among the planet’s major carbon sinks.
The new report estimates that forests stored an estimated 714bn tonnes, or gigatonnes, of carbon (GtC) in 2025.
Europe (including Russia) and the Americas account for two-thirds of the world’s total forest carbon storage.
The global forest carbon stock decreased from 716GtC to 706GtC between 1990 and 2000, before growing slightly again by 2025. The report mainly attributes this recent increase to forest growth in Asia and Europe.
The report notes that the total amount of carbon stored in forests has remained largely static over the past 35 years, but with some regional differences, as highlighted in the chart above.
The amount of carbon stored in forests across east Asia, Europe and North America is “significantly higher” now due to expanded forest areas, but it is lower in South America, Africa and Central America.
Several studies have shown that there are limitations on the ability of forests to keep absorbing CO2, with difficulties posed by hotter, drier weather fuelled by climate change.
A 2024 study found that record heat in 2023 negatively impacted the ability of land and ocean sinks to absorb carbon – and that the global land sink was at its weakest since 2003.
Another study, published in 2022, said that drying and warming as a result of deforestation reduces the carbon storage ability of tropical forests, especially in the Congo basin and the Amazon rainforest.
5. Around one-fifth of the world’s forests are located in protected areas
The percentage of forest land in Asia, Africa, Europe, South America, Oceania and North and Central America contained inside protected areas (dark blue) and outside protected areas (light blue) in 2025. Source: Global Forest Resources Assessment 2025
The amount of forested land located in protected areas increased across all regions between 1990 and 2025.
For an area to be considered “protected”, it must be managed in a way that conserves nature.
Around 20% of the world’s forests are located in these protected areas, the new report finds, which amounts to 813Mha of land – an area almost the size of Brazil.
Nearly every country in the world has pledged to protect 30% of the Earth’s land and sea by 2030. However, more than half of countries have not committed to this target on a national basis, Carbon Brief analysis showed earlier this year.
Almost 18% of land and around 8% of the ocean are currently in protected areas, a UN report found last year. The level is increasing, the report said, but considerable progress is still needed to reach the 2030 goal.
The new UN report notes that Europe, including Russia, holds 235Mha of protected forest area, which is the largest of any region and accounts for 23% of the continent’s total forested land.
As highlighted in the chart above, 26% of all forests in Asia are protected, which is the highest of any region. The report notes that this is largely due to a vast amount of protected forested land in Indonesia.
Three countries and one island territory reported that upwards of 90% of their forests are protected – Norfolk Island, Saudi Arabia, Cook Islands and Uzbekistan.
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UN report: Five charts showing how global deforestation is declining
This month marks 10 years since the UK recorded its first named storm.
Storm Abigail struck in November 2015, bringing high winds, lightning and snow and causing power cuts and school closures in northern Scotland.
In the decade that has passed, storm naming has become a key part of how the Met Office warns the public about impending storms.
Storm naming is a public safety tool that makes severe weather easier to remember, talk about and follow.
The success of the scheme offers lessons for how clear communication can help communities prepare, adapt and build resilience in a changing climate.
Here, we look back at a decade of naming storms in the UK and some of the most notable events.
Storms in the UK
Storms in the UK typically take place during the autumn and winter months and last for between two and three days.
The number of named storms varies from year to year. Some storm seasons – for example, 2023–24 – are exceptionally active, while others are much quieter.
The UK owes its stormy climate in large part due to the jet stream – fast-moving winds that blow from west to east high in the atmosphere and push low-pressure weather systems across the Atlantic.
These low-pressure systems can bring heavy rain and strong winds to the UK, which, in turn, causes storms.
Storms in the UK can cause serious damage, felling trees, destroying infrastructure and causing travel disruptions.
Some have resulted in widespread flooding – and others, tragically, in loss of life.
Over the last decade, the UK has seen a number of storms with extreme wind speeds and heavy rainfall.
The table below sets out a list of records set by storms between November 2015 and October 2025.
| Maximum hourly gust speeds | Storm Eunice, 2022 | 122 miles per hour (mph) |
| Highest daily rainfall total | Storm Desmond, 2015 | 264.4mm |
| Lowest mean sea level pressure | Storm Éowyn, 2025 | 941.9 hectopascals (hPa) |
UK storm records for the period November 2015–October 2025. Source: Met Office
Storm naming
Storm naming was introduced in the UK and Ireland at the start of the 2015 storm season.
Launched by the Met Office and Ireland’s weather service, Met Éireann, Dutch weather service the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI) joined the storm-naming scheme in 2019.
This collaboration between the UK, Ireland and Netherlands is one of three storm-naming groups in Europe. Each group releases a new alphabetical list of storm names in September.
The graphic below highlights the storm names picked by the Western European storm-naming group for 2025-26.
Not all storms are named. A storm will be named if the Met Office anticipates it having potential to cause disruption or damage.
This is often linked to whether strong winds are expected, but impacts caused by other weather types – for instance, heavy rain, hail or snow – are also considered.
Once named, the storm is referred to consistently by weather services and other authorities in Ireland, Netherlands and the UK.
Storm naming was introduced to improve communication of the weather forecast to the public and help people stay safe during severe weather.
Using a single, authoritative name for a storm allows government and media outlets to deliver a consistent message about approaching severe weather.
In this way, the public will be better placed to keep themselves, their homes and businesses safe.
There have typically been around half a dozen named storms each year since November 2015, although this varies on a year-to-year basis.
The 2023-24 storm season saw the most named storms to date. In August 2024, Storm Lillian became the 12th named storm of that season.
Below is a table of all the storms that have been named since 2015.
Storms named between November 2015 and October 2025. Source: Met Office.
Notable named storms
While every year since the scheme began has seen storms strong enough to be named, some storms have been particularly significant.
Storm Desmond, December 2015
Storm Desmond brought extreme rainfall to north-west England. The weather station in Honister Pass in Cumbria recorded 34.1cm of rainfall in just 24 hours in a new UK record. Another record was set when 405mm of rain fell at Thirlmere in Cumbria over two consecutive days.
The subsequent floods affected thousands of homes and businesses across Cumbria and other parts of northern England, sweeping away several bridges and cutting road and rail links.
Storm Desmond led to the government launching the National Flood Resilience Review.
Storm Arwen, November 2021
Storm Arwen is an example of how the damages caused by a storm depends on more than its overall strength. A storm’s location, duration and wind direction also plays a role.
This storm occurred after an area of pressure in the North Sea drove very strong northerly winds across north-eastern parts of the UK. Winds gusted at up to 98mph at Brizlee Wood in Northumberland.
The unusual wind direction of Storm Arwen resulted in the felling of thousands of trees and left more than a million homes without power. Parts of the Pennines also saw significant disruption from lying snow.
Storms, like Arwen, that have a wind direction different to the prevailing south-westerly direction are less frequent, but are nevertheless a key part of the UK’s climate.
Storm Eunice, February 2022
In February 2022, three named storms affected the UK within the space of a week. The second of these storms was Storm Eunice.
Storms in close succession can cause particular problems because clean-up efforts can be hampered by further severe weather.
Storm Eunice was the most severe and damaging storm to affect England and Wales since February 2014. Gusts reached 122mph at Needles on the Isle of Wight – the highest on record for England at a low-level station.
The storm caused deaths, widespread damage to buildings and major travel disruption, including the temporary closure of the Port of Dover.
Storm Babet, October 2023
Storm Babet was notable for prolonged and intense rainfall which led to severe flooding, evacuations and sadly, deaths. In eastern Scotland, particularly in the county of Angus, rainfall totals reached 150-200mm, with some areas experiencing their wettest day on record since 1891.
A key factor with this storm was its unusual track, or path. The storm moved south to north, picking up additional moisture as it crossed the Bay of Biscay. A high-pressure “blocking” weather system over Scandinavia prevented Babet clearing the UK eastwards into the North Sea. As a result, high wind speeds were sustained across north-east England and much of Scotland for a prolonged period.
Storm Éowyn, January 2025
Storm Éowyn was the UK’s most powerful windstorm in more than decade, with the brunt of impacts felt in Northern Ireland and Scotland’s populous Central Belt.
Gusts exceeded 90mph in Northern Ireland – where this was the most severe wind storm since 1998 – while a 100mph gust was recorded at Drumalbin in Lanarkshire.
Roads were closed, flights, ferries and trains were cancelled and more than a million homes were reported to be without power at the peak of the storm. Scotland’s national botanical collection at the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh saw several dozen felled or badly damaged trees.
Storm Éowyn’s intensity and geographic reach made it a standout event in recent years.
The timeline below shows how the Met Office worked with Met Éireann and KNMI to alert the public about Storm Éowyn.
Climate change and storms
There is no evidence of positive or negative trends in windstorm number or intensity in the UK’s recent climate.
Trends in windstorm frequency are difficult to detect, because numbers vary year-to-year and decade-to-decade.
Most climate projections indicate that winter windstorms will increase slightly in number and intensity over the UK, including disproportionately more severe storms. However, scientists have “medium confidence” in these projections – because a few climate models indicate differently.
This uncertainty highlights the need for ongoing research into how climate change may influence the severity and frequency of windstorms in northern Europe.
On the other hand, scientists are confident that climate change is making rainfall during storms more intense.
A 2024 attribution study involving Met Office scientists showed that climate change has made rainfall during storms more intense through autumn and winter in the UK. The researchers noted that this trend is set to increase as the planet warms.
Recent increases in flooding in the UK have also been linked to climate change.
Other research, meanwhile, has found that sea level rise caused by climate change will worsen storm surges and high waves during windstorms.
The continuing unpredictability of UK storms – combined with projections of increased rainfall and heightened coastal damage under climate change – means that being prepared for, and adapting to, the future weather is crucial.
The post Met Office: Ten years of naming UK storms to warn the public appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Met Office: Ten years of naming UK storms to warn the public
Climate Change
Analysis: Fossil-fuel CO2 emissions to set new record in 2025, as land sink ‘recovers’
Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fossil fuels and cement will rise around 1.1% in 2025, reaching a record 38.1bn tonnes of CO2 (GtCO2), according to the latest figures from the Global Carbon Project.
However, falling land-use emissions means that global CO2 emissions in 2025 will remain relatively unchanged compared to 2024 levels.
The 20th edition of the annual Global Carbon Budget report, published today, also finds that the land carbon sink – the portion of human-caused CO2 emissions absorbed by plants and soils – appears to have recovered to its pre-El Niño strength after two unusually weak years.
However, research published alongside the report by the same team also suggests that climate change has caused a long-term decline in land and ocean carbon sinks, with sinks being about 15% weaker over the past decade than they would have been without climate impacts.
The study, published in Nature, finds that the decline of carbon sinks has contributed about 8% to the rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration since 1960.
The 2025 Global Carbon Budget report also estimates that:
- Emissions in China and India are projected to grow much less in 2025 compared to the past decade, while emissions in the US and EU are projected to grow this year after years of decline.
- Global CO2 emissions from land-use change are expected to decrease by nearly 10% in 2025, driven by reductions in deforestation and forest degradation in South America.
- Total CO2 emissions – fossil and land use – have grown more slowly over the past decade (0.3% per year on average) compared to the previous decade (1.9% per year).
- The remaining carbon budget to limit global warming to 1.5C is virtually exhausted and is equivalent to only four years of current emissions. Carbon budgets to limit warming to 1.7C and 2C would similarly be used up in 12 and 25 years, respectively.
- The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is set to reach 425.7 parts per million (ppm) in 2025, 2.3ppm above 2023 and 52% above pre-industrial levels.
(For detailed coverage of previous editions of the report, see Carbon Brief’s coverage for 2024, 2023 and 2022.)
Global emissions remain flat
The Global Carbon Budget (GCB) finds that total global CO2 emissions in 2025 – including those from fossil fuels and land use – are projected to remain approximately flat at 42.2GtCO2, falling by a negligible -0.04% compared to last year.
This means 2025 is effectively tied with 2024 as the highest global CO2 emissions on record.
Flat total CO2 emissions in 2025 reflect a combination of continued rising emissions from fossil fuel and industry and declining emissions from land-use change. Fossil CO2 emissions rose 1.1% to 38.1GtCO2, while land-use emissions declined by -9.8% to 4.1GtCO2 (albeit with large uncertainties).
The figure below shows the 2025 global CO2 emissions update (red solid line) alongside 2024 (dark blue dotted), 2023 (mid blue dotted) 2022 (light blue dotted), 2021 (light grey dotted) and 2020 (dark grey dotted). The shaded area indicates the uncertainty around the new 2025 budget.
(Each year, the GCB is updated to include the latest data as well as improvements to modelling sources and sinks, resulting in some year-to-year revisions to the historical record.)
The 2025 figures are notably higher than those in the prior five GCB reports, reflecting an upward revision in historical land-use emissions. (This is discussed in more detail in the land-use emissions section below.)
Total global CO2 emissions have notably flattened in the past decade (2014-25), growing at only 0.3% per year compared to the 1.9% rate of growth during the prior decade (2004-13) and the longer-term average growth rate of 1.6% over 1959-2014.
This apparent flattening is due to declining land-use emissions compensating for continued – but slow – increases in fossil CO2 emissions. Fossil emissions grew around 0.2GtCO2 per year over the past decade, while land-use emissions decreased by a comparable amount.
However, despite the emissions plateau, there is still no sign of the rapid and deep decrease in CO2 emissions needed to reach net-zero and stabilise global temperatures in-line with the Paris Agreement temperature goal.
If global emissions remain at current levels, the remaining carbon budget to limit warming to 1.5C (with a 50% chance) will be rapidly exhausted.
(The carbon budget is the total amount of CO2 that scientists estimate can be emitted if warming is to be kept below a particular temperature threshold. Earlier this year, the Indicators of Global Climate Change report estimated the remaining carbon budget had declined by three-quarters between the start of 2020 and the start of 2025.)
With human-caused global warming sitting at around 1.36C above pre-industrial levels in 2024, the remaining budget for 1.5C is 170GtCO2, equivalent to four years of current emissions.
The GCB report finds that the remaining carbon budgets to limit warming to 1.7C and 2C have been reduced to 525GtCO2 (12 years at current emissions levels) and 1,055GtCO2 (25 years), respectively.
Global fossil CO2 emissions also grew more slowly in the past decade (0.8% per year) compared to the previous decade (2.1%). This was driven by the continued decarbonisation of energy systems – including a shift from burning coal to gas and replacing fossil fuels with renewables – as well as slightly weaker global economic growth during the past decade.
The figure below breaks down global emissions (dark blue line) in the 2025 budget into fossil (mid blue) and land-use (light blue) components. Fossil CO2 emissions represent the bulk of total global emissions in recent years, accounting for approximately 90% of emissions in 2025 (compared to 10% for land use). This represents a large change from the first half of the 20th century, when land-use emissions were approximately the same as fossil emissions.
Global fossil emissions include CO2 emitted from burning coal, oil and gas, as well as the production of cement. However, to determine total fossil emissions, the Global Carbon Budget also subtracts the cement carbonation sink – CO2 slowly absorbed by cement once it is exposed to the air – from fossil emissions.
Global emissions can also be expressed on a per-capita basis, as shown in the figure below.
While it is ultimately total global emissions that matter for the Earth’s climate – and a global per-capita figure glosses over a lot of variation among, and within, countries – it is noteworthy that global per-capita fossil emissions peaked in 2012 and have been slightly declining in the years since.
Land-use emissions continue downward trend
Global land-use emissions stem from deforestation, forest degradation, loss of peatlands and harvesting trees for wood. They averaged around 5.0GtCO2 over the past decade (2015-24) and the Global Carbon Budget provides an initial projection for 2025 of 4.1GtCO2.
This represents a 0.5GtCO2 decrease in land-use emissions relative to 2024. The GCB report suggests that this was largely driven by a combination of reductions in deforestation and forest degradation in South America and by the end of the dry 2023-24 El Niño conditions.
Overall, land-use emissions have decreased by around 32% compared to their average in the 2000s, with a particularly large drop in the past decade. This decline is statistically significant and is due both to decreasing deforestation and increasing levels of reforestation and afforestation globally.
Three countries – Brazil, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) – collectively contribute approximately 57% of the global land-use emissions. In the past, China has been a meaningful contributor to land-use emissions, but in recent years its land-use emissions have turned net-negative as more trees have been planted than cut down.
The figure below shows changes in emissions over time in these countries, as well as land-use emissions in the rest of the world (grey).
Historical land-use emissions have been revised upward in the 2025 GCB report compared to prior estimates. This reflects a combination of two factors:
- The discontinuation of one of the four bookkeeping models that GCB has historically relied on for land-use emissions estimates. This model tended to show lower land-use emissions than the others.
- The inclusion of the impacts from CO2 fertilisation on global biomass densities. Because forests have higher biomass densities now than in the past, due to increasing CO2, this tends to increase the estimate of land-use emissions for recent years.
Fossil-fuel CO2 hits record highs
Global emissions of fossil CO2 – including coal, oil, gas and cement – increased by around 1.1% in 2025, relative to 2024, with an uncertainty range of 0.2-2.2%. This represents a new record high and surpasses the prior record set in 2024.
The figure below shows global CO2 emissions from fossil fuels, divided into emissions from major emitting countries including China (dark blue shading), the US (mid blue), the EU (light blue), India (light blue) and the remainder of the world (grey).
China represents 32% of global CO2 emissions today. Its 2025 emissions are projected to increase by a relatively small 0.4% (with an uncertainty range of -0.9% to 2%), driven by a small rise in emissions from coal (0.3%), a modest rise in gas (1.3%) and a larger rise in oil (2.1%).
Given the uncertainty range, a decrease in Chinese emissions is also a possibility, but this will not be confirmed until the full 2025 data is available.
Similarly, recent analysis for Carbon Brief found that China’s emissions were “finely balanced between a small fall or rise” in 2025. However, it said that a drop in the full-year total became more likely after a 3% decline in September. (The Global Carbon Project estimates are based on data covering January through to August, which point towards a small rise in 2025.)
Whether China’s emissions see small rise or fall in 2025, the outcome will be due to moderate growth in energy consumption combined with an extraordinary growth in renewable power generation. This would represent the second year in a row where Chinese emissions growth was well below the average rate over the past decade.
The US represents 13% of global emissions and emissions in 2025 are projected to increase by 1.9% (-0.2 to +4.1%) compared with 2024. This marks a reversal from recent trends in declining CO2 emissions.
The projected growth of emissions in the US is likely driven by a combination of three factors: a colder start to the year after a mild 2024, which led to greater heating requirements, higher gas prices, which led to more coal being used in power generation, as well as an increase in total demand for electricity.
US emissions from coal are expected to increase by a substantial 7.5% in 2025, emissions from both oil and gas by a more modest 1.1% and emissions from cement to fall by -8.0%.
While policies enacted by the current US administration may increase CO2 emissions going forward, their impact on national emissions levels in 2025 were likely relatively modest compared to other factors.
India represents 8% of global emissions. In 2025, its emissions are projected to increase by 1.4% (-0.3% to +3.1%) on 2024 levels, significantly below recent trends.
An early monsoon with the highest-ever May rainfall substantially reduced cooling requirements in May and June, the hottest months of the year. Strong growth or renewables – particularly solar – has also helped limit the growth of Indian emissions.
Indian emissions from coal are expected to grow 1.7%, with oil growing 0.1%, gas shrinking by -6.4% and cement growing by 9.9%.
The EU represents 6% of global emissions. Its emissions are projected to increase by 0.4% in 2025, with an uncertainty range of -2.1 to +2.8%. This represents a divergence from a past decline in emissions (albeit with large uncertainties).
EU emissions from coal are expected to decline by -0.3%, whereas emissions from oil and gas are projected to increase by 0.6% and 0.9%, respectively. Cement emissions are expected to fall by -4.1%.
The increase in EU emissions is in part from weather-related low hydropower and wind generation which – despite increases in solar – have led to an increase in electricity generation from gas. In addition, a relatively cold February led to increased use of natural gas for space heating.
International aviation and shipping (included in the “rest of world” in the chart above) are responsible for 3% of global emissions. They are projected to increase by 6.8% for aviation, but remain flat for international shipping. This year will be the first time that aviation emissions have exceeded pre-Covid levels.
The rest of the world (excluding aviation) represents 38% of global emissions. Emissions are expected to grow by 1.1% in 2025 (ranging from -1.1% to +3.3%), with increases in emissions from coal (1%), oil (0.5%), gas (1.8%) and cement (2.4%).
The total emissions for each year over 2022-25, as well as the countries and regions that were responsible for the changes in absolute emissions, are shown in the figure below.
Annual emissions for 2022, 2023, 2024 and estimates for 2025 are shown by the black bars. The smaller bars show the change in emissions between each set of years, broken down by country or region – the US (dark blue), EU (mid blue), China (light blue), India (pale blue) and the rest of the world (grey). Negative values show reductions in emissions, while positive values reflect emission increases.
The US represented a large part of the rise in global fossil-fuel emissions in 2025. US emissions increases over 2024-25 contributed about 40% of the total global increase – more than the EU, China and India contributions combined.
The Global Carbon Project notes that emissions have declined over the past decade (2015-24) in 35 nations, which collectively account for 27% of global emissions. This is up from 18 countries during the prior decade (2005-14).
The decrease in emissions in those countries comes despite continued domestic economic growth and represents a long-term “decoupling” of CO2 emissions and the economy.
The carbon intensity of energy has consistently decreased over the past decade in China, the US, the EU – and, to a lesser extent, globally.
However, peaking CO2 emissions requires that the rate of decarbonisation exceeds the growth in energy demand. This has happened in some regions, including the US and EU, but not yet globally.
Modest growth in emissions from coal, oil, gas and cement
Global fossil-fuel emissions primarily result from the combustion of coal, oil and gas.
In 2025, coal is responsible for more emissions than any other fossil fuel, representing approximately 42% of global fossil-fuel CO2 emissions. Oil is the second largest contributor at 33% of fossil CO2, while gas comes in at 21%.
The production of cement is responsible for around 3.8% of global emissions, but this is reduced to 1.9% once the carbonation sink – the drawdown of atmospheric CO2 by concrete – is taken into account.
These percentages reflect both the amount of each fossil fuel consumed globally, but also differences in CO2 intensities. Coal results in the most CO2 emitted per unit of heat or energy produced, followed by oil and gas.
The figure below shows global CO2 emissions from different fuels over time, covering coal (dark blue), oil (mid blue) and gas (light blue), as well as cement production (pale blue) and other sources (grey).
While coal emissions increased rapidly in the mid-2000s, they have largely flattened since 2013. However, coal use increased significantly in 2021 and then more modestly in the subsequent four years.
Global emissions from coal increased by 0.8% in 2025 compared to 2024, while oil emissions increased 1.0% and gas emissions increased by 1.3%.
Despite setting a new record this year, global coal use is only 6% above 2013 levels – a full 13 years ago. By contrast, during the 2000s, global coal use grew at a rate of around 4% every single year.
The figure below shows the total emissions for each year over 2022-25 (black bars), as well as the absolute change in emissions for each fuel between years.
Global oil emissions were suppressed for a few years after the 2020, but rebounded to pre-pandemic levels as of 2024 and have continued to grow in 2025.
This reflects that, despite falling sales of internal combustion engine vehicles, not enough electric vehicles (EVs) have yet been sold to result in peak oil demand.
The global carbon budget
Every year, the Global Carbon Project provides an estimate of the overall “global carbon budget”. This is based on estimates of the release of CO2 through human activity and its uptake by the oceans and land, with the remainder adding to atmospheric concentrations of the gas.
(This differs from the commonly used term “remaining carbon budget”, which refers to the amount of CO2 that can be released while keeping warming below global limits of 1.5 or 2C.)
The most recent budget, including estimated values for 2025, is shown in the figure below.
Values above zero represent sources of CO2 – from fossil fuels and industry (dark blue shading) and land use (mid blue) – while values below zero represent carbon sinks that remove CO2 from the atmosphere. Any CO2 emissions that are not absorbed by the oceans (light grey) or land vegetation (mid grey) accumulate in the atmosphere (dark grey). In addition, a dashed black line is shown to represent the expected sum of sinks based on estimated emissions.
Over the past decade (2015-24), the world’s oceans have taken up approximately 29% of total human-caused emissions, or around 11.8GtCO2 per year.
The ocean CO2 sink has been relatively flat since 2014 after growing rapidly over the prior decades, reflecting the flattening of global emissions during that period.
This estimate for carbon sinks has been revised up from 26% in prior versions of the GCB, reflecting a major update to carbon budgets driven by new data and modelling of carbon sink behavior.
The land sink takes up around 21% of global emissions, or 8.7GtCO2 per year on average over the past decade – discussed in more detail in the section below. This is down from 29% in prior budgets.
The atmosphere continues to accumulate the bulk of human-caused CO2 emissions, with about 49% going into the atmosphere on average over the past decade – a rate of 20.4GtCO2 per year.
The growth rate of atmospheric CO2 in 2025 is expected to be around 2.3ppm, which is a bit below the decadal average rate of 2.6ppm over the past decade (2015-24). This is well below the record-setting rise of 3.7ppm in 2024, which was primarily driven by the effect of the 2023-24 El Niño conditions weakening the land sink.
Atmospheric CO2 concentrations are set to reach an annual average of 425.7ppm in 2025, representing an increase of 52% above pre-industrial levels of 280ppm.
There remains an unusual imbalance in the carbon budget in 2024, where the sum of the sinks is notably larger than estimated emissions. This can be seen in the figure above, where the dashed line is below the shaded area.
Budget imbalances are not unprecedented – there are large uncertainties in both emissions data and sink estimates. But the rise in the amount of CO2 accumulating in the atmosphere in 2024 is larger than would be expected based on emissions.
There are a number of potential explanations for this 2024 imbalance. The land cover data for 2024 is not yet complete and it is possible that some fire emissions data might be missing from the record. This might result in either higher land-use emissions or lower land sinks than currently estimated.
Alternatively, it could be due to the CO2 growth rate – captured by surface stations managed by the US National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration (NOAA) – being slightly high. CO2 records for 2024 from these stations are higher than those obtained from satellite-based sensors, though it remains unclear which provides the most accurate measurement.
A declining, but not collapsing, land sink
After an usually weak land carbon sink in 2023, there were a number of media articles about its potential collapse.
For example, in October 2024, the Guardian wrote that “the sudden collapse of carbon sinks was not factored into climate models – and could rapidly accelerate global heating”.
The truth is a bit more complicated. While the impending collapse of the land carbon sink has been greatly exaggerated, there is growing evidence of a long-term weakening of both the land and ocean carbon sinks due to human activity.
And while the land sink has recovered to its pre-El Niño strength in 2025, aided by relatively low global fire CO2 emissions, it will continue to gradually weaken as global temperatures rise. This is not unexpected – scientists have long foreseen a weaker carbon sink in a warmer world.
A weaker land sink will contribute to higher global temperatures in the future as more CO2 emissions from burning fossil fuels and land use change will accumulate in the atmosphere.
The figure below shows the percentage of human emissions absorbed by the land sink in every year since 1959, with a recovery upwards in 2025 after two relatively low years.
In a study published in Nature alongside the release of the 2025 Global Carbon Budget, the same team of researchers provide a detailed estimate of exactly how the land and ocean sinks have changed as a result of human activity.
The research finds that the land and ocean sinks are 25% smaller and 7% smaller, respectively, than they would have been without the effects of climate change over 2015-24.
This amounts to a nearly 20% reduction in the efficacy of current global carbon sinks – that is, both the land and ocean – and a 15% reduction compared to how large they would be without the effects of climate change.
The figure below, from the new paper, shows the impact of climate change on the ocean sink (blue), the land sink (green) and atmospheric CO2 concentrations (grey) since 1960.
The weakening of carbon sinks due to human activity has led to an increase of atmospheric CO2 of more than 8ppm since 1960. The combined effects of climate change and deforestation have turned tropical forests in south-east Asia and in large parts of South America from CO2 sinks to sources.
And these sinks will likely continue to weaken as long as atmospheric CO2 concentrations continue to rise and the world continues to warm. There are a wide range of estimates of carbon cycle feedbacks among climate models, but a large carbon cycle feedback could result in a few tenths of a degree of future warming.
The post Analysis: Fossil-fuel CO2 emissions to set new record in 2025, as land sink ‘recovers’ appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Analysis: Fossil-fuel CO2 emissions to set new record in 2025, as land sink ‘recovers’
Sailing for about an hour in the Amazon river’s delta, a flotilla of dozens of boats carrying hundreds of people raised Indigenous concerns about Brazil’s oil and gas, mining and agricultural expansion in their forests.
In Belém’s Parque da Cidade, climate negotiators gather for the first COP hosted in the Amazon rainforest. Outside the conference halls, Indigenous activists demanded outcomes that address threats from agriculture, fossil fuels and mining in their communities.
The activists will meet at the People’s Summit, a civil society event parallel to COP30, which organisers say is meant to denounce false climate solutions. Boat passengers carried signs reading “agriculture passes, destruction stays” and “we are the climate resistance”.
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Raimundo Tupinambá, chief of the Pajurá tribe, said that he and his village were there “to demonstrate against the federal government, the state government, and the parliamentarians who are pushing projects that could affect both the environment and us, the indigenous peoples”.
Chief Raoni Metuktire, an Indigenous leader who was recently awarded the highest decoration of Brazilian diplomacy by president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva for his decades of climate activism, said at the event that these communities shouldn’t be facing the climate impacts they have been experiencing, among them an extreme drought last year that scientists linked to climate change.
“This river where we are could dry up, too,” Raoni said.
Raoni also talked about the recent licenses Lula gave to Petrobras to explore oil off the Amazon coast, saying that projects like that could cause severe problems for the world, “first us, the Indigenous Peoples, but also all of you, all of us will have environmental problems.”
The demonstration happened one day after protesters clashed with security guards as they stormed their way into the COP30 conference venue. When asked about that, Indigenous groups at the flotilla said that they didn’t organise it, but weren’t necessarily against it.
Sailing along the soy corridor
One of the main boats in the flotilla was a vessel named ‘Caravan of the Response,’ a nod to the ‘we are the response’ slogan from Indigenous peoples and had been sailing for a week, having started 3,000 kilometres inland in Sinop, Mato Grosso.
The route is meant to emulate Brazil’s “soy corridor”, a network of roads, railways and waterways designed to move soybeans from inland production areas to ports for export. One of the boats carried a banner reading “agribusiness doesn’t fill your plate”.
The vessel also carried a large banner rejecting the Ferrogrão, a railway of nearly 1,000 kilometres that would become part of the soy corridor and would connect Sinop – Brazil’s soybean capital – to the state of Pará, where Belém is located. The project has been halted since 2021 due to possible environmental impacts. Tupinambá said Ferrogrão is one of his people’s main fights and called its possible construction a “predatory activity.”
If built, the railway would affect at least six indigenous lands, home to approximately 2,600 people, and 17 conservation areas, according to Brazilian media.
Inside the boat, on the first of four floors, activists played music, danced and sold traditional Indigenous food. The top floors were full of hammocks reserved for the people who did the trip from Sinop.
Making the case for rivers
With flags reading “The Arapiuns river talks, we listen”, the group of hundreds of Indigenous activists also sought to raise awareness on the health of rivers in the Amazon region, which experienced severe drought last year.
Arapiuns, a river over 1,300 km from Belém, has a tributary connection to the Tapajós, the fifth biggest of all the rivers that lead to the Amazon River. During the 2024 drought, it dried to its lowest levels.
Jéssica Kumaruara, an Indigenous activist from the region, was on the boat holding a sign that read “the Tapajós River, enchanted dwellings that also sustain us, is asking for help.”
She grew up in the area, and told Climate Home that she and her community will fight to defend their beloved river, “that the government wants to turn into a route for agribusiness”.
“When they kill our river, when they leave it in the forests, they are killing us too. It is a way of killing us and we are here to say that we are not going to stop, we are not going to keep quiet, we are going to fight until the end.”
The post “They are killing us too”: Amazon flotilla raises Indigenous concerns at COP30 appeared first on Climate Home News.
“They are killing us too”: Amazon flotilla raises Indigenous concerns at COP30
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