The approximately $ 50 trillion global economy runs primarily on energy generated from carbon-emitting sources. About 99% of the variation in annual global carbon dioxide emissions from 1980 to 2006 can be explained simply by variations in the aggregate level of global gross domestic product (GDP). For those seeking to reduce emissions, recent data provide a cause for concern - in the current decade (up to the point where data are most recently available), the world has emitted twice as much carbon dioxide per marginal unit of economic activity than in the previous decade.[1] This sobering fact serves as a stark reminder that during the period of greatest concern about the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere that accumulation has been accelerating. The effects of the global financial crisis are not yet fully understood in terms of slowing GDP and emissions, but it is likely that it will represent just a pause in global economic growth, which by all accounts is expected to pick up in coming years.
One of the central challenges of mitigation policy - that is policies focused on stabilizing the concentration of carbon dioxide (and other greenhouse gases) at a low level - is to break the close connection of economic activity and carbon emissions, while maintaining economic growth. To gain perspective on this challenge, this section of WIREs Climate Change - The Carbon Economy and Climate Mitigation - presents an overarching framework to organize reviews of various factors that lead to increasing emissions and those actions that might be employed to reduce them.
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