Germany now EU's worst polluter as CO2 emissions rise

Germany is the European Union's worst polluter, with its production of CO2 gasses from fossil fuel rising by two percent in 2013 to 760 million tonnes, official data showed on Wednesday.

The EU's statistics agency Eurostat found that while emissions were cut across the 28-member bloc by an average of 2.5 percent in 2013, they actually went up in six countries, including Germany.

Denmark registered a 6.8 percent increase in CO2 emissions, in Estonia it was up by 4.4 percent, followed by Portugal (+3.6 percent), France (+0.6 percent) and Poland (+0.3 percent).

The strongest cuts in CO2, which account for 80 percent of the greenhouse gas emissions causing global warming, came from Cyprus, where emissions went down by 14.7 percent, followed by Romania (-14.6 percent) and Spain (-12.6 percent).

The EU produced a total 3.35 billion tonnes of CO2 in 2013, down from the total of 3.43 billion tonnes in 2012.

Germany, Britain, France, Italy, Poland, Spain and the Netherlands account for 77 percent of the EU's CO2 emissions.

© 2014 AFP