All data were calculated by the US Department of Energy's Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center (CDIAC), mostly based on data collected from country agencies by the United Nations Statistics Division. Countries are ranked by their metric tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions per capita in 2008. The data only considers carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels and cement manufacture, but not emissions from land use such as deforestation.
The carbon dioxide emissions of a country are only an indicator of one greenhouse gas. For a more complete idea of how a country influences climate change, gases such as methane and nitrous oxide should be taken into account. This is particularly so in agricultural economies.