America’s greenhouse gas emissions fell 1.9 percent in 2023, in large part because the burning of coal to produce electricity plummeted to its lowest level in half a century, according to estimates published on Wednesday by the Rhodium Group, a nonpartisan research firm.
The researchers looked at planet-warming emissions generated by transportation, electricity, industry and buildings but did not include pollution from agriculture, which accounts for roughly 10 percent of the nation’s greenhouse gases.
To speed action on climate change, Congress in 2022 approved a record amount of federal money for low-emissions technologies like solar panels, wind turbines, nuclear reactors, electric vehicles and hydrogen fuels.
Last month, the Environmental Protection Agency finalized a regulation that would, for the first time, require oil and gas producers to detect and fix leaks of methane from hundreds of thousands of existing wells.
And on Friday, the Department of Energy announced a conditional $189 million loan guarantee to LongPath Technologies, which plans to mount lasers on giant towers to monitor methane leaks at oil and gas fields across the country.
But globally, carbon dioxide emissions still soared to record levels last year, driven in large part by an increase in fossil fuel use in China, India and other fast-growing countries.
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