Media release; 18 November 2025
A new report by Scientists for Global Responsibility (SGR) reveals that almost all official data on military greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions – even for those militaries with extensive GHG reporting practices – only reveals a small fraction of their carbon footprint.
SGR analysed two sets of data on national military greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The first are figures submitted to the United Nations as part of official ‘national inventories’. The second are those published separately by governments in, for example, annual reports of defence ministries or central government climate reports.
The analysis found that:
- Data submitted to the UN on direct military emissions (known as ‘Scope 1’) is little more than half the level in government reports. The UN figures would need to be increased by an average of 95% to match the government figures. Data from the USA, the UK, Germany, Canada and Australia was used for this analysis.
- Data submitted to the UN on direct military emissions covers, on average, less than 10% of the estimated carbon footprint of a military (including ‘Scope 1, 2, and 3’). The UN figures would need to be multiplied by between 10 and 14 times to match the government figures. Data from Norway was used for this analysis, with further data, especially from the UK, Germany, Australia and Switzerland, used to check the credibility of this finding.
- Not a single nation reports on the GHG emissions arising from the impacts from any war-fighting activities (known as ‘Scope 3+’).
The report also reveals some examples of ‘greenwashing’ related to the reporting of military GHGs in the UK.
Research published by the Military Emissions Gap has already revealed that nearly half of 70 leading nations currently submit no data at all on their military GHG emissions through the official UN reporting process.
SGR’s latest analysis reveals that the data that is submitted to the UN only reveals a small proportion of their carbon footprint.
A key reason for the poor quality of the data is that there are considerable flexibilities in the UN reporting system that allow nations to ‘hide’ military emissions within other categories or not report them at all, in the case of emissions in international waters or airspace. These problems date back to 1997 when the USA, supported by other leading military nations, argued special pleading for military emissions.
Reporting of carbon footprints is not carried out through the UN reporting system, but it is now standard international practice for large organisations to report on these emissions. Militaries have yet to catch up with this practice.
The report recommends that the UN should implement, as a matter of urgency, mandatory and explicit military emissions reporting within national inventories. High military spending nations should also publish full assessments of their military carbon footprints, following the example of Norway.
Previous research by SGR and the Conflict and Environment Observatory has estimated that the global military carbon footprint is between 3.3% and 7.0% of global GHG emissions. Further research by SGR has estimated that military carbon footprints grow by about 32 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent for each additional spending increase of $100bn. With military budgets rapidly increasing across the world, the underreporting of military emissions has major implications for efforts to tackle the climate crisis.
Dr Stuart Parkinson, Executive Director of SGR and author of this report, said “Even nations which are leaders in reporting their military GHGs are failing to provide reliable data to the UN on these emissions. It is no wonder that the issue has been missed by the climate science community. As military spending spirals upwards, the UN reporting process urgently needs to be reformed, and governments need to come clean about the entirety of their military carbon footprints. This would be a key step in efforts to reduce these emissions.”
Notes
- The new report is entitled ‘Military greenhouse gas emissions reporting: how reliable is it?’ and is 20 pages long. It is available to download via:
https://www.sgr.org.uk/publications/military-greenhouse-gas-emissions-reporting-how-reliable-it - Scientists for Global Responsibility (SGR) is a UK-based membership organisation which promotes responsible science and technology. Its membership includes hundreds of natural scientists, social scientists, and engineers. It carries out research, education, and advocacy work centred around science and technology for peace, social justice and environmental sustainability. For more information, see: https://www.sgr.org.uk/
- The main GHG datasets used for this analysis were for the years 2021 and 2022. Some additional data from other years between 2019 and 2023 were also used, depending on availability. 2022 was the final year of data released by the USA before reporting was suspended by the Trump administration.
- The datasets published by the Military Emissions Gap can be downloaded from: https://militaryemissions.org/
As an example, the dataset for 2022 covers 70 nations – the top 60 military spenders and 10 other industrialised nations. 32 (46%) of these nations did not publish any military data for this year. A similar proportion was seen in other years. - The two previous SGR reports quoted in the text above are:
Estimating the military’s global greenhouse gas emissions (2022)
https://www.sgr.org.uk/publications/estimating-military-s-global-greenhouse-gas-emissions
Military spending rises and greenhouse gas emissions: what does the research say? (2025)
https://www.sgr.org.uk/publications/military-spending-rises-and-greenhouse-gas-emissions-what-does-research-say - Dr Stuart Parkinson is executive director of SGR. His background includes a PhD in climate science, experience as an expert reviewer for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and work on military technologies and security strategies. He is lead author of several influential reports on military GHG emissions, see:
https://www.sgr.org.uk/projects/climate-change-military-main-outputs
