Top US Industries by Total CO2e Emissions in EPA GHGRP
PlainCarbon ranks NAICS-based industry groupings by total CO2-equivalent emissions reported to the EPA GHGRP, updated automatically as new data is published.
Research period:
Every figure on PlainCarbon is rendered directly from EPA Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program (GHGRP) data, no number is typed in by an editor. This page draws directly on the EPA Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program (GHGRP), no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.
Research question
Which industry groupings drive the largest share of Scope 1 emissions in the EPA Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program, and how does emissions intensity per facility vary across industries?
Methodology
This ranking is generated directly from PlainCarbon's industries dataset at the time you load the page, no figure is hardcoded, and the table updates automatically whenever the underlying U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) data is refreshed.
Coverage and exclusions: records with no reported emissions are excluded from this ranking rather than shown as zero. The EPA occasionally withholds individual facility values for confidentiality or data-quality reasons; those records are left out of this ranking rather than displayed as zero. If the EPA later revises a figure, the revised value appears here automatically the next time PlainCarbon's data is refreshed.
Source and update cadence: this data comes from the EPA Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program (GHGRP), which publishes updated facility-level emissions annually. PlainCarbon pulls each new release, checks it for consistency, and replaces the prior dataset so every page reflects the latest published figures.
Corrections: if you believe a figure here is wrong, please use the contact channels in the site footer. We compare disputed figures against the underlying EPA record before making any change; genuine data errors are corrected at the source so every affected page updates together, not just this one.
See the methodology page for the complete ETL pipeline, source vintage, and column lineage.
Top US Industries by Total CO2e Emissions in EPA GHGRP
Updated automatically as new EPA GHGRP data is published
The ranked top 10
These 10 rows update automatically whenever PlainCarbon's underlying EPA data is refreshed.
| # | Industry group | Total CO2e (MMT) | Reporting facilities | Reporting companies | Avg CO2e per facility (kt) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Power Plants | 1,550.46 | 1,732 | 483 | 895.2 |
| 2 | Chemicals | 283.31 | 534 | 200 | 530.5 |
| 3 | Other | 150.19 | 1,600 | 636 | 93.9 |
| 4 | Petroleum and Natural Gas Systems | 146.31 | 2,099 | 175 | 69.7 |
| 5 | Minerals | 111.57 | 434 | 112 | 257.1 |
| 6 | Waste | 97.06 | 1,433 | 582 | 67.7 |
| 7 | Metals | 91.6 | 363 | 144 | 252.4 |
| 8 | Petroleum Product Suppliers | 69.17 | 83 | 48 | 833.4 |
| 9 | Pulp and Paper | 37.06 | 246 | 69 | 150.6 |
| 10 | Natural Gas and Natural Gas Liquids Suppliers | 15.67 | 127 | 52 | 123.4 |
Source: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) - EPA GHGRP industry / subpart aggregations. Values update automatically each time PlainCarbon's EPA data is refreshed. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) - EPA GHGRP industry / subpart aggregations. Values update automatically each time PlainCarbon's EPA data is refreshed.
Findings
Top entity in the ranking
The top-ranked record in this dataset is Power Plants, with a value of 1,550.46 on the Total CO2e (MMT) column. The full top-10 set is rendered in the table above. Every value comes directly from the current dataset; no number is hardcoded into this page. When the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) publishes a revision, the ranking and the prose around it update automatically.
Distribution shape
The gap between the top-ranked record (1,550.46) and the 10th-ranked record (15.67) characterizes how concentrated the top of the distribution is. Where the top value is many multiples of the median value of the visible set, the population is highly concentrated, a small number of entities accumulate the bulk of the measured quantity. Where the top and bottom of the visible set are close together, the distribution is relatively flat across the top end. The full distribution beyond this top-10 cut is summarized in the aggregate context section below and explored in the linked entity profiles.
Aggregate context
Across the full population behind this ranking, here are the summary statistics: how many records exist in total, the sum of the ranking metric across all qualifying records, and the mean per-record value. The methodology page documents the exact filter applied (records with null or zero values on the ranking metric are excluded). This aggregate row is computed from the same dataset that powers the ranking above.
Source provenance
The records in this ranking originate from U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), specifically the EPA GHGRP industry / subpart aggregations. PlainCarbon pulls each new EPA release and replaces the prior data, so this ranking always reflects the most recently published EPA vintage rather than a stale export. The methodology page documents the source URL, the vintage date, and how we process the data.
Why this ranking matters
Rankings like this one let a reader scan a population quickly and identify outliers, concentrations, and patterns that warrant deeper investigation. The detail pages linked from each entity in the table above give the full per-entity context: time-series history where available, related metrics from adjacent tables, and links onward to the underlying source records. The methodology page explains how an entity earns inclusion in the dataset and how the ranking column is computed at the source.
What this analysis cannot tell us
Industry classifications follow the GHGRP's facility-type categorization, which combines NAICS codes with subpart-specific reporting rules (Subpart D for power plants, Subpart W for oil-and-gas systems, etc.). Some facilities report under multiple subparts; the industry classification reflects the primary reporting subpart. Per-facility intensity (kt CO2e per facility) varies dramatically within industries because of facility-size differences, a 2,000-MW coal plant and a 100-MW gas peaker plant both classify as 'Power Plants' but emit vastly different totals. Industry rankings shift over time as facilities shut down (coal plant retirements), are added (new natural-gas combined-cycle plants), or change subpart classification. The GHGRP frame captures direct combustion and process emissions; product-use emissions (fossil fuel suppliers' downstream emissions) are reported separately under Subpart RR and not aggregated into facility totals.
Secondary cut from the same source
Industries by per-facility emissions intensity (industries with at least 10 reporting facilities)
Sources
- EPA, Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program by sector - https://www.epa.gov/ghgreporting/ghgrp-and-reporting-program
- EPA FLIGHT industry view - https://ghgdata.epa.gov/ghgp/main.do