UK: biggest carbon polluters 2019

The Germany-based energy company RWE was the most polluting company in the United Kingdom in 2019. RWE produced 12.7 million metric tons of carbon dioxide (MtCO2) that year, which was twice the amount produced by the UK’s second-largest carbon polluter – Tata Steel. The 10 largest polluters accounted for roughly 15 percent of total UK CO2 emissions in 2019.

Energy supply emissions in the UK

While the UK’s most polluting companies operate across several industries, most are within the energy supply sector. The energy supply sector is a leading contributor to UK greenhouse gas emissions, accounting for nearly a quarter of the country’s annual total in 2019. Although emissions from energy supply remain high, they have fallen considerably in recent decades, and as of 2016 have remained below transportation emissions.

Emissions from fossil fuel use

The main reason for the substantial drop in UK energy supply emissions is the move away from coal – the most polluting fossil fuel. Since 2000, UK coal emissions have plummeted almost 90 percent as it has gradually been replaced by other energy sources such as natural gas and renewables. The UK government has announced that coal-fired electricity generation will cease in 2024.

Carbon dioxide emissions from selected companies in the United Kingdom in 2019 (in million metric tons of CO2)

Characteristic	Emissions in million metric tons of CO2
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Release date

December 2020

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Region

United Kingdom

Survey time period

2019

Supplementary notes

The source adds the following methodology "The data comes from the EU Union Registry, the publicly accessible online database that keeps record of the verified emissions from each installation and aviation operator which are part of the EU Emission Trade System (ETS).
The EU ETS is the world's biggest carbon market. All major polluters across the EU are required to sign up to it. This is one of the few registries that record emissions from the aviation sector, but those emissions come only from intra-EU flights.
The database contains 985 installations in the UK, which account for 129 million tonnes of emissions. This is 30% of all the CO2 produced in the UK in 2019.
Sky News has looked at the 70% most polluting installations, and it has tracked who are the ultimate owners of those plants.
The total number of emissions attributed to each group is conservative and should be treated as “at least”, as it does not take into account CO2 emission from other sources under the companies' control."

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