U.S. Emissions Were Flat in 2024. Flat Is the Wrong Direction.

U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2024 were about 20 percent below 2005 levels, which is the year used as the benchmark for the country’s reduction pledge under the Paris Agreement. Sounds okay! Until you hear that they were also about 20 percent below 2005 levels in 2023.

That’s the conclusion from the Rhodium Group, which analyzes various energy and climate data, in its report on last year’s emissions — overall, the U.S. saw a drop of 0.2 percent, which is essentially nothing. “In 2024, US greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions did something a bit unusual—they stayed nearly unchanged from last year,” the report read. That tiny decline occurred while the economy grew by 2.7 percent, which is a promising sign of a “decoupling” of growth from emissions, but it still puts the country well off from where it needs to be to hit its 2030 and 2035 targets. And it follows a 3.3 percent drop in 2023, which at least suggested things were moving in the right direction.

Emissions from the industrial sector fell by 1.8 percent in 2024, and from the oil and gas sector by 3.7 percent. But people drove and flew more, apparently, so transportation sector emissions rose by 0.8 percent. Electricity demand also rose, by 3 percent, which was met with increases in generation from fossil gas as well as from wind and solar power — a bright spot, as the renewable sources surpassed coal power generation for the first time. Still, the increased gas use helped the power sector’s emissions rise by a bit, at 0.2 percent.

“The modest 2024 decline underscores the urgency of accelerating decarbonization in all sectors,” the Rhodium report said. The U.S. had previously set a goal of a 50 to 52 percent decline below 2005 levels by 2030; to get there, Rhodium said that it would need to see a 7.6 percent drop each of the next five years, “a level the US has not seen outside of a recession in recent memory.”

And beyond that it gets harder. Countries have a February deadline to submit their updated pledges, known as Nationally Determined Contributions, under Paris; the US was among the first to do so, promising to cut emissions by 61 to 66 percent by 2035. We won’t get their by standing still.