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🇯🇵 Japan's Yearly Greenhouse Gas Emissions in CO₂ Equivalent

Japan's Yearly Greenhouse Gas Emissions in CO₂ Equivalent

Key Insights

2024 Emissions Profile

Japan's emissions in 2024 were dominated by CO2, at around 960 megatonnes CO2, or roughly 93% of the national total. CO2 fell by about 28 megatonnes CO2 per year, or 2.6% annually, over the ten years to 2024. Methane was around 28 megatonnes CO2e (2.8%) and declined by 1.2% annually; nitrous oxide was about 18 megatonnes CO2e (1.7%) and also fell by 1.2%. F-gases were around 26 megatonnes CO2e (2.6%) and rose by 1.7% annually.

Historic Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Emissions

CO2 emissions began at roughly 12 megatonnes CO2 in 1851 and rose gradually to around 25 megatonnes CO2 by the late 1880s. Growth accelerated after the early 1950s, reaching over 1,200 megatonnes CO2 by the late 1990s. Emissions peaked at roughly 1,300 megatonnes CO2 in 2013, then declined to around 960 megatonnes CO2 in 2024.

Historic Methane (CH4) Emissions

Methane emissions started at around 9 megatonnes CO2e in 1851 and increased gradually until the mid-twentieth century. They then rose rapidly to a peak of roughly 75 megatonnes CO2e in 1970, before declining for several decades to around 28 megatonnes CO2e in 2024. Methane's warming contribution since 1851 was around 17% smaller than its emissions alone suggest, because methane's short atmospheric lifetime dampens the warming impact when CH4 emissions are falling.

Historic Nitrous Oxide (N2O) Emissions

Nitrous oxide emissions began at roughly 2 megatonnes CO2e in 1851 and increased slowly until the late 1930s. They rose sharply around the 1940s, then continued upward more gradually, peaking at nearly 40 megatonnes CO2e in 1996. Emissions subsequently declined to around 18 megatonnes CO2e in 2024.

Historic Fluorinated Gases (F-gases) Emissions

F-gas emissions were negligible through the early twentieth century, becoming more substantial from the mid-century onward. They rose from around 9 megatonnes CO2e in 1969 to a peak of roughly 62 megatonnes CO2e in 1996. Emissions then fell, reaching about 19 megatonnes CO2e in 2009, before recovering to around 26 megatonnes CO2e in 2024.

Background

Greenhouse gas emissions from human activities are the main drivers of human-induced warming. In the scientific literature, human-induced emissions are often referred to as anthropogenic emissions.

  • Carbon Dioxide (CO2)
  • Methane (CH4)
  • Nitrous oxide (N2O)
  • Fluorinated gases (F-gases)

Emissions from all different gases are expressed in CO2-equivalent units to make it possible to compare the relative emissions from these different gases. CO2-equivalents are calculated using the global warming potentials of the respective gases, in this case using a 100-year time horizon.

Wikipedia: Global Warming Potential

Total Historic Share

Emissions from all different gases are expressed in CO2-equivalent units to make it possible to compare the relative emissions from these different gases. CO2-equivalents are calculated using the global warming potentials of the respective gases, in this case using a 100-year time horizon.

Crabon Dioxide (CO2)

CO2 includes emissions from fossil fuels and industry (FFI), and from land-use, land-use-change, and forestry (LULUCF).

Methane (CH4)

Methane emissions are caused by human activities such as rearing livestock, agricultural practices, and fugitive fossil fuel emissions.

Nitrous Oxide (N2O)

Common sources of these emissions are fossil fuel emissions and the agricultural use of synthetic fertilizer and manure.

Fluorinated Gases (F-gases)

Fluorinated gases are a group of gases defined by UNFCCC: hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs), sulfur hexafluoride (SF6), and nitrogen trifluoride (NF3). Fluorinated gases are also known as halogenated gases.

Wikipedia: Greenhouse Gas Emissions
 IPCC: Annual Report 6, 5.2.1 5.2 Historical Trends, Variability and Budgets of CO2, CH4 and N2O

Units and Measures

CO2-equivalent emissions are expressed in the total weight in megatonnes per year. 1 Megatonne is equal to 1 million tonnes.

Wikipedia: Megatonne
 Wikipedia: Global warming potential

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About the Data

National CO2 emissions data through 2024 is from the Global Carbon Project and covers fossil sources and land-use change. Emissions data through 2024 for CH4, N2O and F-gases comes from the PRIMAP-hist dataset, which combines several published sources into historical emissions time series.

The Key Insights paragraph was created using a large language model (LLM) in combination with our data, historic events, and a structured approach for best accuracy by separating the context generation from the interpretation and narrative.

Data Sources

Global Carbon Budget 2025 Global Carbon Budget
Update cycle: yearlyDelay: ~ 10 months after the end of the year. Current year values are estimated and published in November.Credits: Friedlingstein, P., O'Sullivan, M., Jones, M. W., Andrew, R. M., Bakker, D. C. E., Hauck, J., Landschützer, P., Le Quéré, C., Li, H., Luijkx, I. T., Peters, G. P., Peters, W., Pongratz, J., Schwingshackl, C., Sitch, S., Canadell, J. G., Ciais, P., Aas, K., Alin, S. R., Anthoni, P., Barbero, L., Bates, N. R., Bellouin, N., Benoit-Cattin, A., Berghoff, C. F., Bernardello, R., Bopp, L., Brasika, I. B. M., Chamberlain, M. A., Chandra, N., Chevallier, F., Chini, L. P., Collier, N. O., Colligan, T. H., Cronin, M., Djeutchouang, L., Dou, X., Enright, M. P., Enyo, K., Erb, M., Evans, W., Feely, R. A., Feng, L., Ford, D. J., Foster, A., Fransner, F., Gasser, T., Gehlen, M., Gkritzalis, T., Goncalves De Souza, J., Grassi, G., Gregor, L., Gruber, N., Guenet, B., Gürses, Ö., Harrington, K., Harris, I., Heinke, J., Hurtt, G. C., Iida, Y., Ilyina, T., Ito, A., Jacobson, A. R., Jain, A. K., Jarníková, T., Jersild, A., Jiang, F., Jones, S. D., Kato, E., Keeling, R. F., Klein Goldewijk, K., Knauer, J., Kong, Y., Korsbakken, J. I., Koven, C., Kunimitsu, T., Lan, X., Liu, J., Liu, Z., Liu, Z., Lo Monaco, C., Ma, L., Marland, G., McGuire, P. C., McKinley, G. A., Melton, J., Monacci, N., Monier, E., Morgan, E. J., Munro, D. R., Müller, J. D., Nakaoka, S.-I., Nayagam, L. R., Niwa, Y., Nutzel, T., Olsen, A., Omar, A. M., Pan, N., Pandey, S., Pierrot, D., Qin, Z., Regnier, P. A. G., Rehder, G., Resplandy, L., Roobaert, A., Rosan, T. M., Rödenbeck, C., Schwinger, J., Skjelvan, I., Smallman, T. L., Spada, V., Sreeush, M. G., Sun, Q., Sutton, A. J., Sweeney, C., Swingedouw, D., Séférian, R., Takao, S., Tatebe, H., Tian, H., Tian, X., Tilbrook, B., Tsujino, H., Tubiello, F., van Ooijen, E., van der Werf, G., van de Velde, S. J., Walker, A., Wanninkhof, R., Yang, X., Yuan, W., Yue, X., and Zeng, J.: Global Carbon Budget 2025, Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss. [preprint], https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-659, in review, 2025.

PRIMAP-hist The PRIMAP-hist national historical emissions time series (1750-2024)
Update cycle: Every few monthsDelay: Less than 1 yearCredits: Gütschow, J.; Busch, D.; Pflüger, M. (2025): The PRIMAP-hist national historical emissions time series v2.7 (1750-2024). zenodo. doi:10.5281/zenodo.17090760

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