Countries by fossil CO2 emissions per person
Qatar had the highest fossil CO2 emissions per person of 213 countries in 2017, at 39.04 tonnes of CO2 per person. Democratic Republic of the Congo had the lowest, at 0.03 tonnes of CO2 per person. The median was 2.98 tonnes of CO2 per person and the figure for the World was 4.71 tonnes of CO2 per person. Source: Global Carbon Project.
Map of countries, 2017
- Under 0.4
- 0.4 to 1.1
- 1.1 to 2.7
- 2.7 to 5
- 5 to 8.8
- 8.8 and over
- No data
Top 40 countries, 2017
Full ranking
| Rank | Countries | 2017 | Change on 2016 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Qatar | 39.04 | +11% |
| 2 | Curaçao | 29.48 | -20.3% |
| 3 | Trinidad and Tobago | 27.88 | +0.5% |
| 4 | Kuwait | 24.07 | -7.3% |
| 5 | Bahrain | 22.21 | +0.4% |
| 6 | Brunei | 21.51 | +20.5% |
| 7 | United Arab Emirates | 21.28 | -15.7% |
| 8 | Saudi Arabia | 20.94 | +0.3% |
| 9 | New Caledonia | 19.69 | +1.8% |
| 10 | Sint Maarten | 18.04 | -7.7% |
| 11 | Kazakhstan | 17.03 | +3.7% |
| 12 | Australia | 16.72 | -0.7% |
| 13 | United States | 15.64 | -1.9% |
| 14 | Luxembourg | 15.51 | -0.3% |
| 15 | Canada | 15.39 | +1.1% |
| 16 | Oman | 14.62 | -3.1% |
| 17 | Estonia | 14.13 | +6.7% |
| 18 | Faroe Islands | 14 | +10.7% |
| 19 | South Korea | 12.71 | +2.2% |
| 20 | Palau | 12.14 | +3.4% |
| 21 | Taiwan | 12.09 | +1.8% |
| 22 | Russia | 11.36 | +1.7% |
| 23 | Saint Pierre and Miquelon | 11.14 | +0.2% |
| 24 | Mongolia | 11 | +30.5% |
| 25 | Iceland | 10.51 | +1% |
| 26 | Czechia | 10.22 | +0.9% |
| 27 | Bermuda | 10.09 | +4% |
| 28 | Libya | 9.96 | +15.1% |
| 29 | Turkmenistan | 9.68 | -0.9% |
| 30 | Greenland | 9.56 | +5.2% |
| 31 | Germany | 9.44 | -2.1% |
| 32 | Netherlands | 9.37 | -2.2% |
| 33 | Japan | 9.32 | -1.2% |
| 34 | Singapore | 8.94 | +1.6% |
| 35 | Anguilla | 8.89 | -8.6% |
| 36 | Turks and Caicos Islands | 8.81 | +3.5% |
| 37 | Poland | 8.8 | +4.1% |
| 38 | Belgium | 8.73 | -0.9% |
| 39 | Aruba | 8.42 | +0.1% |
| 40 | Norway | 8.38 | -1.9% |
| 41 | Iran | 8.19 | +6.5% |
| 42 | Ireland | 8.12 | -4.4% |
| 43 | Finland | 8.11 | -5.7% |
| 44 | Austria | 7.91 | +2.8% |
| 45 | South Africa | 7.63 | -4.4% |
| 46 | Malaysia | 7.56 | +1.2% |
| 47 | New Zealand | 7.41 | +2.3% |
| 48 | Slovenia | 7.1 | +1.1% |
| 49 | China | 7.08 | +2% |
| 50 | Israel | 7.04 | -5.5% |
| 51 | Greece | 6.96 | +5.1% |
| 52 | Bulgaria | 6.71 | +5.4% |
| 53 | Slovakia | 6.66 | +3.3% |
| 54 | Antigua and Barbuda | 6.64 | +0.7% |
| 55 | Bosnia and Herzegovina | 6.46 | +3.2% |
| 56 | Serbia | 6.46 | +1.8% |
| 57 | Bahamas | 6.46 | +11.5% |
| 58 | Andorra | 6.41 | -2.1% |
| 59 | Belarus | 6.26 | +2.2% |
| 60 | Denmark | 6.01 | -6.7% |
| 61 | Cyprus | 5.96 | +0.2% |
| 62 | Italy | 5.84 | -1.4% |
| 63 | United Kingdom | 5.84 | -3.7% |
| 64 | Spain | 5.84 | +5.1% |
| 65 | Hong Kong | 5.7 | -2.6% |
| 66 | Caribbean Netherlands | 5.61 | +4.5% |
| 67 | Montserrat | 5.57 | -11.8% |
| 68 | British Virgin Islands | 5.49 | -18.1% |
| 69 | Portugal | 5.34 | +9.8% |
| 70 | Türkiye | 5.18 | +4.4% |
| 71 | France | 5.18 | +0.6% |
| 72 | Saint Kitts and Nevis | 5.14 | +1.6% |
| 73 | Seychelles | 5.12 | +1.6% |
| 74 | Hungary | 5.05 | +5.3% |
| 75 | Barbados | 4.99 | +1.8% |
| 76 | Ukraine | 4.91 | -4.2% |
| 77 | Nauru | 4.85 | +5.5% |
| 78 | Lithuania | 4.69 | +2.8% |
| 79 | Croatia | 4.59 | +5% |
| 80 | Venezuela | 4.55 | -8.3% |
| 81 | Chile | 4.53 | -1.7% |
| 82 | Switzerland | 4.52 | -3.4% |
| 83 | Lebanon | 4.52 | +8% |
| 84 | Cook Islands | 4.51 | +1.7% |
| 85 | Equatorial Guinea | 4.36 | -12.7% |
| 86 | Iraq | 4.26 | +7% |
| 87 | Argentina | 4.22 | -2.4% |
| 88 | Sweden | 4.21 | -3.5% |
| 89 | Niue | 4.12 | +0.1% |
| 90 | Liechtenstein | 4.11 | +3.2% |
| 91 | Suriname | 4.09 | -17.4% |
| 92 | Romania | 4.03 | +4.2% |
| 93 | Thailand | 3.98 | -0.7% |
| 94 | Algeria | 3.96 | +2.3% |
| 95 | Mexico | 3.76 | -3.9% |
| 96 | Latvia | 3.71 | +1% |
| 97 | North Macedonia | 3.65 | +8.5% |
| 98 | Mauritius | 3.52 | +4.6% |
| 99 | Azerbaijan | 3.48 | -1.1% |
| 100 | Uzbekistan | 3.42 | -2.5% |
| 101 | Montenegro | 3.39 | +5.1% |
| 102 | Maldives | 3.3 | +2.2% |
| 103 | Malta | 3.29 | +8.7% |
| 104 | Marshall Islands | 3.15 | +5.2% |
| 105 | French Polynesia | 3.13 | +0.5% |
| 106 | Botswana | 3.12 | +9.9% |
| 107 | Macao | 2.98 | +6.2% |
| 108 | Guyana | 2.81 | -2.9% |
| 109 | Saint Lucia | 2.81 | +4.2% |
| 110 | Laos | 2.8 | +17.8% |
| 111 | Jamaica | 2.76 | -4.7% |
| 112 | Tunisia | 2.72 | +1.2% |
| 113 | North Korea | 2.7 | +102.7% |
| 114 | Georgia | 2.65 | +0.1% |
| 115 | Gabon | 2.55 | -4.6% |
| 116 | Jordan | 2.55 | +2.2% |
| 117 | Grenada | 2.54 | +6.4% |
| 118 | Egypt | 2.44 | +1.3% |
| 119 | Brazil | 2.43 | +0.4% |
| 120 | Vietnam | 2.39 | +1.7% |
| 121 | Ecuador | 2.34 | -2% |
| 122 | Panama | 2.33 | -9% |
| 123 | Dominica | 2.25 | -9.2% |
| 124 | Dominican Republic | 2.2 | -3.9% |
| 125 | Bhutan | 2.19 | +4.8% |
| 126 | Cuba | 2.18 | -11.4% |
| 127 | Wallis and Futuna | 2.15 | +1% |
| 128 | Indonesia | 2.14 | +3.1% |
| 129 | Saint Vincent and the Grenadines | 2.01 | -11.6% |
| 130 | Saint Helena | 2 | -24.8% |
| 131 | Bolivia | 1.96 | +2.9% |
| 132 | Armenia | 1.9 | +6.5% |
| 133 | Albania | 1.84 | +17.3% |
| 134 | Uruguay | 1.82 | -5.9% |
| 135 | Syria | 1.79 | +18% |
| 136 | Belize | 1.79 | -3.3% |
| 137 | India | 1.78 | +1.9% |
| 138 | Peru | 1.75 | +2.3% |
| 139 | Colombia | 1.73 | -10.2% |
| 140 | Morocco | 1.72 | +3.3% |
| 141 | Costa Rica | 1.63 | +1.1% |
| 142 | Moldova | 1.59 | +5.2% |
| 143 | Fiji | 1.58 | +8.2% |
| 144 | Kyrgyzstan | 1.51 | -4.4% |
| 145 | Namibia | 1.43 | -2.5% |
| 146 | Tonga | 1.36 | +2.8% |
| 147 | Micronesia | 1.31 | -0.4% |
| 148 | Paraguay | 1.25 | +8.9% |
| 149 | Philippines | 1.24 | +9.7% |
| 150 | Samoa | 1.14 | -2.5% |
| 151 | Cape Verde | 1.11 | +7.5% |
| 152 | Honduras | 1.06 | +0.7% |
| 153 | Lesotho | 1.06 | +11.4% |
| 154 | Republic of the Congo | 1.06 | -3.7% |
| 155 | Guatemala | 1.03 | +1% |
| 156 | Sri Lanka | 1 | -1.6% |
| 157 | El Salvador | 0.96 | -9.8% |
| 158 | Pakistan | 0.95 | +18.3% |
| 159 | Nicaragua | 0.86 | -0.2% |
| 160 | Mauritania | 0.85 | +32.5% |
| 161 | Eswatini | 0.84 | -5.7% |
| 162 | Angola | 0.78 | -10.5% |
| 163 | Tajikistan | 0.76 | +11.6% |
| 164 | Cambodia | 0.75 | +12% |
| 165 | Papua New Guinea | 0.71 | -9% |
| 166 | Senegal | 0.7 | +4.4% |
| 167 | Palestine | 0.69 | -1.4% |
| 168 | Tuvalu | 0.67 | +0.6% |
| 169 | São Tomé and Príncipe | 0.67 | -6.5% |
| 170 | Zimbabwe | 0.66 | -8.5% |
| 171 | Kiribati | 0.58 | +24.8% |
| 172 | Nigeria | 0.56 | -5.6% |
| 173 | Timor-Leste | 0.55 | +5.7% |
| 174 | Bangladesh | 0.53 | +4.9% |
| 175 | Vanuatu | 0.5 | -9.5% |
| 176 | Sudan | 0.48 | -0.6% |
| 177 | Benin | 0.46 | +1.6% |
| 178 | Myanmar | 0.46 | +10.9% |
| 179 | Côte d’Ivoire | 0.45 | -2.6% |
| 180 | Nepal | 0.44 | +22.9% |
| 181 | Zambia | 0.43 | +21% |
| 182 | Solomon Islands | 0.42 | -4.6% |
| 183 | Ghana | 0.41 | -12.6% |
| 184 | Cameroon | 0.4 | -6.5% |
| 185 | Djibouti | 0.39 | -4.9% |
| 186 | Guinea | 0.39 | +75% |
| 187 | Comoros | 0.35 | +26% |
| 188 | Kenya | 0.33 | -2.8% |
| 189 | Haiti | 0.29 | +3.8% |
| 190 | Yemen | 0.28 | -11% |
| 191 | Afghanistan | 0.26 | +5.2% |
| 192 | Gambia | 0.25 | -1.3% |
| 193 | Mozambique | 0.25 | -21.6% |
| 194 | Tanzania | 0.24 | -3.4% |
| 195 | Mali | 0.24 | +7.7% |
| 196 | Togo | 0.24 | -18.7% |
| 197 | Burkina Faso | 0.23 | +12.6% |
| 198 | Eritrea | 0.18 | -1% |
| 199 | Chad | 0.15 | -4.9% |
| 200 | Sierra Leone | 0.15 | -6.1% |
| 201 | Madagascar | 0.14 | +13.8% |
| 202 | South Sudan | 0.14 | -9.9% |
| 203 | Liberia | 0.14 | +1.2% |
| 204 | Uganda | 0.13 | +8.4% |
| 205 | Ethiopia | 0.13 | -0.8% |
| 206 | Niger | 0.1 | +1.1% |
| 207 | Guinea-Bissau | 0.1 | +6.1% |
| 208 | Rwanda | 0.1 | +8.6% |
| 209 | Somalia | 0.07 | -0.1% |
| 210 | Malawi | 0.07 | -1% |
| 211 | Central African Republic | 0.06 | +18% |
| 212 | Burundi | 0.04 | +17.7% |
| 213 | Democratic Republic of the Congo | 0.03 | +5.9% |
Other periods
About this ranking
Fossil CO2 emissions (fossil_co2_emissions) in tonnes of CO2 divided by the population, as published by the Global Carbon Project with the population series it ships with the dataset.
More on how it is measured
- Fossil CO2 covers the burning of coal, oil and gas, gas flaring, cement production and other industrial carbonate use.
- Emissions are counted in the country where they occur (territorial emissions).
- International aviation and shipping are left out of country figures and included in the World total.
- Land use change is not included.
Countries that refine oil or produce energy intensive goods for export, and small states with large ports or refineries, show high values that their residents' consumption alone would not cause. Each annual Global Carbon Budget release revises past years.
Every value in the ranking comes from the same publisher and the same period, so the countries are compared on one definition. Equal values share a rank.
How to cite
Andrew, R. M. and Peters, G. P., The Global Carbon Project's fossil CO2 emissions dataset, Global Carbon Budget (Friedlingstein et al.). Global Carbon Project fossil CO2 emissions dataset: fossil CO2 emissions per person, tonnes of CO2. https://zenodo.org/records/17417124. Retrieved 2026-10-12. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.
Citation styles
APA 7
Global Carbon Project. (2025). Global Carbon Project fossil CO2 emissions dataset: fossil CO2 emissions per person, tonnes of CO2 (Countries by fossil CO2 emissions per person, 2017) [Data set]. Retrieved October 12, 2026, from https://zenodo.org/records/17417124
MLA 9
Global Carbon Project fossil CO2 emissions dataset: fossil CO2 emissions per person, tonnes of CO2, Countries by fossil CO2 emissions per person, 2017. Global Carbon Project, 22 Oct. 2025, https://zenodo.org/records/17417124. Invokely, https://invokely.ai/rankings/fossil-co2-emissions-per-capita/countries?period=2017. Accessed 12 Oct. 2026.
Chicago (author-date)
Global Carbon Project. 2025. Global Carbon Project fossil CO2 emissions dataset: fossil CO2 emissions per person, tonnes of CO2. Countries by fossil CO2 emissions per person, 2017. Dataset. Accessed October 12, 2026. https://zenodo.org/records/17417124. Also distributed by Invokely, https://invokely.ai/rankings/fossil-co2-emissions-per-capita/countries?period=2017.
Harvard
Global Carbon Project (2025) Global Carbon Project fossil CO2 emissions dataset: fossil CO2 emissions per person, tonnes of CO2, Countries by fossil CO2 emissions per person, 2017 [Dataset]. Available at: https://zenodo.org/records/17417124, via Invokely: https://invokely.ai/rankings/fossil-co2-emissions-per-capita/countries?period=2017 (Accessed: 12 October 2026).
BibTeX
@misc{global_countries_by_fossil_co2_2017,
author = {{Global Carbon Project}},
title = {{Global Carbon Project fossil CO2 emissions dataset: fossil CO2 emissions per person, tonnes of CO2: Countries by fossil CO2 emissions per person, 2017}},
year = {2025},
howpublished = {Data set},
url = {https://zenodo.org/records/17417124},
urldate = {2026-10-12},
note = {Accessed via Invokely, https://invokely.ai/rankings/fossil-co2-emissions-per-capita/countries?period=2017. Publisher attribution: Andrew, R. M. and Peters, G. P., The Global Carbon Project's fossil CO2 emissions dataset, Global Carbon Budget (Friedlingstein et al.). Global Carbon Project fossil CO2 emissions dataset: fossil CO2 emissions per person, tonnes of CO2. https://zenodo.org/records/17417124. Retrieved 2026-10-12. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.},
}
RIS
TY - DATA
AU - Global Carbon Project
TI - Global Carbon Project fossil CO2 emissions dataset: fossil CO2 emissions per person, tonnes of CO2: Countries by fossil CO2 emissions per person, 2017
PY - 2025
DA - 2025/10/22
PB - Global Carbon Project
DB - Invokely
UR - https://zenodo.org/records/17417124
L2 - https://invokely.ai/rankings/fossil-co2-emissions-per-capita/countries?period=2017
Y2 - 2026/10/12
N1 - Accessed via Invokely, https://invokely.ai/rankings/fossil-co2-emissions-per-capita/countries?period=2017.
N1 - Publisher attribution: Andrew, R. M. and Peters, G. P., The Global Carbon Project's fossil CO2 emissions dataset, Global Carbon Budget (Friedlingstein et al.). Global Carbon Project fossil CO2 emissions dataset: fossil CO2 emissions per person, tonnes of CO2. https://zenodo.org/records/17417124. Retrieved 2026-10-12. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.
ER -
Use this data in your AI agent
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Rank Countries by fossil CO2 emissions per person using official data, and cite the source.
rank_places {"indicator":"fossil_co2_emissions_per_capita","level":"country","limit":10}
GET https://invokely.ai/api/v1/rank?indicator=fossil_co2_emissions_per_capita&level=country&limit=10
Questions
Which country has the highest fossil CO2 emissions per person?
Qatar, with 39.04 tonnes of CO2 per person in 2017, according to Global Carbon Project.
Which country has the lowest fossil CO2 emissions per person?
Democratic Republic of the Congo, with 0.03 tonnes of CO2 per person in 2017.
Where does this ranking come from?
Every value comes from one source and one period, so the places are comparable: Global Carbon Project, Global Carbon Project fossil CO2 emissions dataset: fossil CO2 emissions per person, tonnes of CO2. Retrieved 2026-10-12.