Just what damage can the emissions from a new fossil fuel facility cause? A new tool has estimates

The emissions from a single coalmine expansion might not seem like a lot when compared with the scale of global emissions, which are measured in gigatonnes (that’s one thousand million tonnes).

However, scientists have been saying for years that every tonne of carbon dioxide adds to global warming, and every fraction of a degree increase matters.

Now, a group of climate scientists have released a new tool that shows the possible consequences of those emissions in detail. The Carbon Impacts Tracer uses peer-reviewed studies to estimate the impact of every megatonne of emissions on people and the environment.

Here, you can see how the emissions from a coalmine expansion in Australia’s Hunter Valley could affect food security and human exposure to heat stress globally.

You can read about the science underlying these projections on the Carbon Impacts Tracer website here.

There are further predicted impacts from releasing 809m tonnes of emissions not listed in the graphic above, including an estimated 107 deaths in Europe, 41,800 additional people put into extreme poverty, 19.4km square of additional glacier area lost, and 38.8m additional heavy labour hours lost annually.