🇰🇿 Kazakhstan's Yearly Greenhouse Gas Emissions in CO₂ Equivalent

Kazakhstan's Yearly Greenhouse Gas Emissions in CO₂ Equivalent

Key Insights

2024 Emissions Profile

In 2024, Kazakhstan's emissions were dominated by CO2 at around 305 megatonnes CO2, or 81.4% of the national total. Methane contributed roughly 53 megatonnes CO2e (14.2%), nitrous oxide around 12 megatonnes CO2e (3.2%), and F-gases about 4.5 megatonnes CO2e (1.2%). Over the ten years to 2024, CO2 emissions fell by about 5.7 megatonnes CO2 per year, while methane, nitrous oxide and F-gases rose, led proportionally by F-gases.

Historic Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Emissions

CO2 emissions began at roughly 33 megatonnes CO2 in 1851 and rose gradually to around 59 megatonnes CO2 by the early 1940s. They then climbed rapidly, reaching about 346 megatonnes CO2 by 1959, before falling irregularly to around 119 megatonnes CO2 in 2002. Emissions recovered to a peak of roughly 352 megatonnes CO2 in 2018, then declined to around 305 megatonnes CO2 in 2024.

Historic Methane (CH4) Emissions

Methane emissions started at about 2.3 megatonnes CO2e in 1851 and increased steadily, accelerating after the early 1930s. They peaked at roughly 70 megatonnes CO2e in 1990, then dropped sharply to around 35 megatonnes CO2e by 1997 before recovering. They reached about 53 megatonnes CO2e in 2024. Methane's warming contribution since 1851 was around 21% larger than its emissions alone suggest, because methane's short atmospheric lifetime amplifies the warming impact when CH4 emissions are rising.

Historic Nitrous Oxide (N2O) Emissions

Nitrous oxide emissions began at roughly 1.8 megatonnes CO2e in 1851 and rose gradually through the early twentieth century, then more strongly after the early 1940s. They peaked at around 17 megatonnes CO2e in 1990, before falling to about 8.8 megatonnes CO2e in 1997. After further variation, emissions rose to around 12 megatonnes CO2e in 2024.

Historic Fluorinated Gases (F-gases) Emissions

F-gas emissions were near zero in 1851 and remained very small through most of the twentieth century, reaching only around 0.6 megatonnes CO2e in 2001. They then increased steadily and more rapidly, reaching their record high of about 4.5 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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