Cop Climate Summits Emit 7 Times More Carbon Than Average Websites

According to a recent study, websites promoting the UN's Cop climate summits are producing around seven times more carbon emissions than the average website. The research, conducted by the Institute for Design Informatics at Edinburgh College of Art, reveals that the digital footprint of Cop websites has grown significantly over the past 30 years.

The analysis shows that average emissions from Cop websites had risen by more than 13,000% between the first summit in 1995 and Cop29 last year. While emissions remained relatively low until Cop14 in 2008, emitting just 0.02g of carbon per page view, they have since skyrocketed to over 2.4g per visit on average, with some sites emitting substantially more.

In contrast, the average website emits around 0.36g of carbon per page view. Researchers say the rise in emissions corresponds with Cop pages increasingly using more resource-intensive content, such as multimedia files.

Experts have also warned that Cop30, scheduled to be held in Brazil between November 10 and 21 this year, will not be hosted on verified renewable energy infrastructure. This raises concerns about the environmental impact of the upcoming climate conference.

The researchers have recommended steps to reduce the digital footprint of Cop websites, including optimizing site layouts, placing strict limits on page sizes, and hosting the websites on servers powered by renewable energy.