Please, in my backyard...

[John ONeill]

13. US emissions

...have gone down, admittedly from a very high start point (the big Anglosphere countries, Canada, USA, and Australia, had CO2 per capita matched only by a few oil sheikdoms.) The main reason, though, is the replacement of coal by gas, which puts out about half the CO2 per watt. It's also much cleaner for particulates and sulfur, so the fumes kill and sicken fewer people. It's still a dirty fossil fuel though - the nitrogen oxides from burning it are also toxic, while methane, which escapes all along the supply chain, is a much more powerful greenhouse gas than CO2, and probably just as bad over the short term. The industry claims only 1-2% fugitive methane, any more than 3-4% would make gas as bad as coal, for the climate (over a 20 year period - CO2 stays in the air longer.)