Abstract
Highly intense forms of human conflict, known as ‘wars’, have proven to be potent
sources of greenhouse gas emissions in recent time, yet a significant portion of
emissions from these wars are still unaccounted for in the world’s leading basis for
climate science, namely the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change. This, in turn, poses a potential gap in the data presented
by the report that could limit its capacity to inform policies within the bounds of the
nexus between conflict and climate change.
By devising a formula derived from existing and transferable GHG inventories
derived from recent and salient wars, particularly of the wars in Ukraine and
Palestine, emission estimates have been assigned to all active wars as of 2023 while
factoring the conflict intensity and total military expenditure tied to these wars.
A total of 84.4 million tCO2e has been estimated to be emitted from activities
associated to all nine active wars within 2023, which was equivalent to the annual
emissions of New Zealand within the same year. A proportion of the total value
amounting to 29.2 million tCO2e is also estimated to be entirely untracked by global
carbon accounting schemes. Furthermore, estimates from new wars (Ukraine,
Palestine, Sudan, and Ethiopia) in 2022 or 2023 have shown to start with greater
intensity than historic estimates of already established wars prior. Enduring wars
(Nigeria, Myanmar, Burkina Faso, Syria, and Somalia) have increased in estimated
emissions across the board from 2022 to 2023. Large scale wars in Ukraine and
Palestine featuring high military expenditures have also driven disproportionate
levels of estimated emissions.
With the worsening trend of war and the emissions associated with it,
recommendations for the inclusion of untracked emissions in global carbon
accounting, increased global priority on peacebuilding, and constant re-evaluations
of GHG inventories to catch up to modern trends in warfare have been
recommended.