BAKU, Azerbaijan — Cities in Asia and the United States emit the most heat-trapping gases that fuel climate change, with Shanghai the most polluting, according to new data combining observations and artificial intelligence.

Seven states or provinces emit more than a billion tons of greenhouse gases, all in China except Texas, which comes in sixth, according to new data from an organization co-founded by the former US Vice President Al Gore and published Friday at the United Nations climate talks in Baku, Azerbaijan.

Nations at talks are trying to set new targets to reduce these emissions and to determine how much rich countries will pay to help the world in this task.

Using satellite and ground observations, supplemented by artificial intelligence to fill in the gaps, Climate Trace sought to quantify carbon dioxide, methane and nitrogen oxide, as well as other traditional air pollutants worldwide, including for the first time in more than 9,000 urban areas. areas.

Earth’s total pollution from carbon dioxide and methane increased by 0.7% to 61.2 billion tonnes, with the short-lived but very potent methane increasing by 0.2%. The numbers are higher than other data sets “because we have very comprehensive coverage and we’ve seen more emissions in more sectors than is generally available,” said Gavin McCormick, co-founder of Climate Trace.

Shanghai’s 256 million tons of greenhouse gases tops all cities and surpassed those of the countries of Colombia or Norway. Tokyo’s 250 million tons would rank in the top 40 nations if it were a country, while New York’s 160 million tons and Houston’s 150 million tons would rank in the top 50 national emissions. Seoul, South Korea, ranks fifth among cities with 142 million tonnes.

“One of the sites in the Permian Basin in Texas is by far the most polluting site in the world,” Gore said. “Maybe this shouldn’t have surprised me, but I think about how dirty some of these sites are in Russia, China, etc. But the Permian Basin puts them all in the shade.

China, India, Iran, Indonesia and Russia recorded the largest increases in emissions between 2022 and 2023, while Venezuela, Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States where pollution has decreased the most.

The dataset – managed by scientists and analysts from various groups – also looked at traditional pollutants such as carbon monoxide, volatile organic compounds, ammonia, sulfur dioxide and other related chemicals looks dirty. Burning fossil fuels releases both types of pollution, Gore said.

This “represents the greatest health threat facing humanity,” Gore said.

Gore criticized the hosting of climate talks, called COPs, by Azerbaijan, an oil-rich country and site of the world’s first oil wells, and by the United Arab Emirates last year.

“It is unfortunate that the fossil fuel industry and petrostates have taken control of the COP process to an unhealthy degree,” Gore said. “Next year in Brazil we will see a change in this trend. But, you know, it’s not good for the global community to give so much control to the world’s number one polluting industry over the whole process.

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has called for more to be done to combat climate change and sought to slow deforestation since returning for a third presidential term. But Brazil produced more oil last year than Azerbaijan and the United Arab Emirates, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

At a news conference Friday by the Alliance of Small Island States, its president, Cedric Schuster, said the negotiating bloc felt the need to remind everyone of the importance of the negotiations.

“We are here to defend the Paris agreement,” Schuster said, referring to the 2015 climate agreement aimed at limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit). “We fear that countries are forgetting that protecting the world’s most vulnerable is at the heart of this framework. » ___

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