According to the European Commission's Joint Research Centre EDGAR v8.0 tables, put any two of 51 tracked economies side by side on total MtCO₂e, emissions per person, and emissions per dollar of GDP for 2023. The same pair can flip order across those three measures.
According to JRC EDGAR v8.0 for 2023, any pair among 51 economies can reorder across absolute MtCO₂e, per-person, and per-GDP intensity; population coverage is 100% and GDP coverage is 100%.
51
economies
100%
population filled
100%
GDP filled
3
compare measures
EU EDGAR v8.0 · AR6 GWP100 · excludes LULUCF. Missing population or GDP leaves that derived cell empty rather than inventing a zero.
China and United States do not keep the same order across absolute total, per person, and GDP intensity. That reorder is the comparison, not a tie-break.
Same pair, three ladders
Absolute MtCO₂e, tonnes per person, and Mt per $B of GDP are different questions. The bars below start with China vs United States (2023) and follow the selectors.
Absolute total (2023). Production-based EDGAR MtCO₂e; LULUCF excluded.
Per person (2023). Total ÷ live population; blank when population is missing.
Per $B GDP (2023). Total ÷ live GDP; blank when GDP is missing.
Population coverage
2023 compare set
51 of 51
Needed for per-person reorder; blank when missing.
GDP coverage
2023 compare set
51 of 51
Needed for intensity reorder; blank when missing.
How to read this comparison
Total emissions answer who emits the most; they track economy size and energy mix,
so large industrial countries dominate. Per person divides those totals by
population and often elevates small, energy-intensive economies. Per $B of GDP
(emissions intensity) shows how much greenhouse gas an economy emits for each dollar of output.
No single measure is the right one. A fair comparison usually looks at all three: a country can be a
top-five absolute emitter yet sit mid-table per person, or have low totals but high intensity.
Methodology and sources
Emissions come from the EU EDGAR
v8.0 database (2024 release), reported as MtCO₂e using AR6 GWP-100 factors and excluding land use
(LULUCF) for cross-country comparability. Population and GDP are the estimates carried in the
PlainEmissions database for the same data year. Per-capita = total ÷ population; intensity = total ÷
GDP. See our methodology for the full pipeline.
Compiled from official public sources by the publisher.
According to the European Commission's Joint Research Centre, the EDGAR v8.0 dataset publishes
country- and sector-level greenhouse-gas inventories on a common bottom-up model. Every figure on
PlainEmissions is rebuilt from that release; no number is typed in by an editor. Comparison figures are computed directly from EDGAR emissions data joined to population and GDP for the same year.
See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the
methodology behind these numbers, or
report a data error. Data current as of EDGAR 2023 (extract 2026-06-20). EDGAR figures are production-based inventory totals for a published reference year (AR6 GWP100, LULUCF excluded on ranked surfaces) - not climate policy advice, real-time emissions, or a substitute for UNFCCC legal inventories.