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  • Glossary item | Last updated: 04 Apr 2024

Greenhouse gas

Bioeconomy

Greenhouse gases constitute a group of gases contributing to global warming and climate change. The Kyoto Protocol, an environmental agreement adopted by many of the parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 1997 to curb global warming, covers six greenhouse gases: - the non-fluorinated gases: carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) , nitrous oxide (N2O) - the fluorinated gases: hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs), sulphur hexafluoride (SF6) Converting them to carbon dioxide (or CO2) equivalents makes it possible to compare them and to determine their individual and total contributions to global warming.

Eurostat b, Glossary, accessed 20 December 2023

Source category: EC Technical Documents

Gaseous constituents of the atmosphere, both natural and anthropogenic, that absorb and emit radiation at specific wavelengths within the spectrum of radiation emitted by the Earth’s surface, by the atmosphere itself, and by clouds. This property causes the greenhouse effect. Water vapour (H2O), carbon dioxide (CO2 ), nitrous oxide (N2O), methane (CH4 ) and ozone (O 3 ) are the primary GHGs in the Earth’s atmosphere. Humanmade GHGs include sulphur hexafluoride (SF6), hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and perfluorocarbons (PFCs); several of these are also O3-depleting (and are regulated under the Montreal Protocol).
 
IPCC, 2022, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) 'Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change'.

Source category: International Organisations