A new climate tracker set to combat greenwashing of emissions statistics has been launched.
Climate TRACE, delivers the most comprehensive emissions monitoring system ever created. It tracks emissions for every major greenhouse gas, sector, country and even more than 660 million individual sources – from power plants and factories to farms and urban areas.
It’s been created by a global coalition of tech experts, universities and NGOs – including former US Vice President Al Gore.
It can track greenhouse gas emissions in near real-time, with fresh monthly data now available just 60 days after the fact.
The goal: to bring radical transparency to global climate data, arming decision-makers with precise, up-to-date information.
Each month’s findings are published on the last Thursday of the month, providing emissions estimates through the end of the previous second month. The data drop includes changes by sector and highlights the top emitters – from nations to cities to individual industrial sites.
This new level of detail, the coalition says, offers the clearest picture yet of global emissions trends.
For January 2025, the initial results suggest a slight but potentially significant shift. Global emissions fell by 0.59% year-on-year to 5.26 billion tonnes of CO2 equivalent – marking the first back-to-back monthly declines since the pandemic. Global methane emissions remained flat at 32.24 million tonnes.
Big emitters – slight dip
China, the world’s largest emitter, saw a 1.1% drop, down 17.4 million tonnes to 1.54 billion tonnes CO2e. The US posted a more modest 0.28% decline, shedding 1.7 million tonnes. Russia’s emissions fell by 0.18%, while Indonesia recorded a 0.32% drop.
India, often viewed as a key battleground for emissions growth, saw a tiny dip of 0.03%, and emissions across the EU dropped 0.53%, or 1.8 million tonnes.
While the declines are small, they could mark a turning point. “We’re seeing, ever so slightly, the right movement,” the coalition said. Whether this signals the start of a true downward trend or just a brief pause remains to be seen – but with monthly data now flowing, the world won’t have to wait long to find out.
The coalition behind Climate TRACE includes tech firms, universities and environmental groups such as RMI, Duke University, Earth Genome, WattTime, Johns Hopkins APL, TransitionZero and Hypervine.
The project is also supported by 100 organisations and researchers contributing key data and analysis.
