Global Carbon Project forecasts 0.4% drop in fossil emissions for 2026

Global carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fossil fuels and cement will fall by around 0.4% in 2026, to 38.2 gigatonnes (GtCO2), according to Carbon Brief's analysis of the Global Carbon Budget published on November 10, 2026. It is the third annual decline of the century, after 2009 and 2020, and the first since the covid-19 pandemic.

The 21st Global Carbon Budget report, presented at COP31 in Antalya, attributes much of the decline to a 1.9% drop in oil emissions, tied to higher energy prices and the supply disruption from the conflict with Iran and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, according to DW. For the region, the figure arrives in a year when rising crude prices dominated the energy agenda in Mexico and other Latin American exporters, while the advance of solar and wind emerges as the structural factor behind the drop.

By fuel, the report estimates a 0.3% decline in natural gas and a 0.6% rise in coal. By region, it projects declines in China (-0.9%), the United States (-1.3%) and the European Union (-1.5%), against a 4.4% increase in India. A parallel study in Nature Climate Change indicates that the deployment of solar, wind and electric vehicles offsets close to two thirds of the emissions that growth in energy demand would generate. Glen Peters, co-author at the CICERO Center for International Climate Research, noted that an annual decline does not equal a peak if it does not stem from structural change, according to DW. Adding land-use change, total CO2 emissions will reach a record 43.3 GtCO2, and the remaining budget to limit warming to 1.5C is 150 GtCO2, less than four years at the current pace.

The projection is preliminary and its range runs from -1.5% to +0.6%, so a smaller increase is not ruled out. The next edition of the budget, in 2027, will show whether the decline holds without the oil factor; the report anticipates that El Niño will weaken the land sink that year.

This note was drafted with the assistance of artificial intelligence from verified sources and reviewed by a human editor before publication.