The Hellenic Ministry of Environment and Energy has officially submitted Greece’s annual greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory for 2024 to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
The data point to a concerning development in the country’s climate policy trajectory, as emissions are increasing rather than declining.
Key findings
- Total GHG emissions in 2024 reached 73.3 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalent, marking a 1.9% increase compared to 2023, when emissions stood at 71.9 million tonnes.
- Net emissions (after subtracting LULUCF—land use, land-use change and forestry—removals) amounted to 68.8 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalent in 2024.
- This level exceeds by approximately 23 million tonnes CO₂e the maximum indicative level implied by Greece’s National Climate Law (Law 4936/2022) for 2030, which mandates a 55% reduction in net emissions compared to 1990 levels.
- Achieving this target now requires an annual reduction in net emissions of approximately 6.6% by 2030.
- To put this challenge into perspective, during the previous six-year period (2018–2024), Greece achieved an average annual reduction of 4.1% in net emissions. This decline was driven largely by the rapid phase-out of lignite, a trend that now offers limited additional reduction potential.
It is therefore clear that meeting legally binding national climate targets will require a significant acceleration of climate action across all sectors. In particular:
- the use of fossil gas in electricity generation must be drastically reduced, as it now accounts for the largest share of the sector’s carbon footprint, and
- the decarbonisation of transport and industry must be substantially accelerated.
The full inventory is available here.
