Key Indicators of Climate Change and the Energy Sector. Special Topic: The Paris Agreement

The 9th WIFO report on key indicators of the energy sector and climate change analyses developments in the use of energy and the progress made in decoupling greenhouse gas emissions from economic growth in 2014. In that year, greenhouse gas emissions in Austria fell by 4.7 percent vis-à-vis 2013, to 76.3 million tons of CO2 equivalents (CO2 emissions dropped by 5.4 percent in the same period). The greatest decline was found in the energy generation sector (–14.4 percent), mostly due to flagging demand for heat generation because of very mild weather. The main contributors to greenhouse gas emissions in 2014 were industry (34.9 percent) and transport (29.1 percent), with the share of both sectors growing, slightly in the past year and substantially since 2000. The report's special topic is on the Paris Agreement, the first global climate agreement, signed at the UN conference in Paris on 12 December 2015.