CO₂ emission clusters within global supply chain networks: Implications for climate change mitigation

Production and consumption of goods and services are interlinked through complex global supply-chain networks; so are the greenhouse gas emissions associated with them. Using a model that represents global supply-chain networks, we identified supply-chain clusters with high CO₂ emissions within more than 300 million individual supply chains. We distinguished 4756 significant CO₂ clusters and found that in 2008, global supply-chain networks associated with U.S. transport equipment and construction demand included relatively large CO₂ clusters in China, accounting for 17% and 10%, respectively, of the U.S. CO₂ footprint. Of added importance is the fact that these two clusters in China had annual growth rates of 42% and 58%, respectively, during the period 1995-2008. Our results show the importance for climate policy of monitoring these CO₂ clusters that dominate CO₂ emissions in global supply chains, and they offer insights on where climate policy can be effectively directed.