VRPdommy

I always hate charts like this as they mislead many.
I always look for the correct perspective when shown them and disregard them as skewed data if I can't get it.
If you look at it close, and double read the text,
It says Changes in Carbon emissions.
Meaning you made more or less compared to some other reference in time (not clear when), and how much difference more or less.
Your not getting the baseline information.
And your not getting what qualifies as a carbon emission or how big the sample data is.

I'm not saying the data is wrong, just that it looks nothing like a authoritative chart I would make decisions from. (they have made no trustable impression on me)

If I were to believe that chart, I would ask what was the big change decreasing those emissions in the US. 'cause I don't see it.
While we are not burning 'as much' coal, we made up for that in Nat Gas and you generate about as much Carbon doing so, just not a lot of the other crap they have to deal with like sulfur dioxide, arsenic and mercury let alone those tiny particles (under 5 microns) they have yet to figure out how to deal with.

Any economy that is growing is naturally is going to be making more of it faster than we can deal with it.

But...
I 'never' bought the CO2 argument to begin with. But that is not saying that man has not done a lot of damage in creating a warming planet faster than it was occurring naturally. Just not from CO2. My opinion anyway.