Too bad these statistics miss an enormous subtraction.

This only includes "OFFICIAL" emissions and sequestration. If Mr. Gore promises to plant a tree, than it is an "official" CO2 sequestration. If an acorn falls and sprouts into a new tree, it doesn't count as it sucks in CO2 to build its cellular mass.

But US forests are between twenty and thirty percent larger in biomass over twenty years ago, according to NASA satellite measurements. Those natural born trees, gorging on the newly available CO2, are no longer as stunted as their predecessors, who ate almost all the CO2 out of the atmosphere.

These new trees just go about their lives sucking in CO2 and expiring O2, but since they don't file sequestratiion reports to the "OFFICIAL" governmental CO2 accountants, it is as if they never existed. Only Goreal "officially" planted trees or promises to plant one, count.

This whole CO2 issue, once upon a time a genuine concern, has been discredited by Science of the 21st century, and is now just nonsense. It is just so much political jsutificatiion for enormous tax increases.

It is still nice that even the "OFFICIAL" and distorted statistics show that the US is producing less CO2.

No one has contradicted the Princeton Studies that reveal that North America is a net sink of CO2. This continent absorbs more atmospheric CO2 than it generates both naturally and man made. It also absorbs and sequestrates some CO2 from the rest of the World as well. Our parklands and wilderness, set aside by Americans and Canadians, provide plenty of Forests and Grasslands to absorb all our CO2, on net.

Also...energy security, in my view is of greater importance than getting obsessed with CO2.

A good example of this in the UK is how car makers have to emphasise CO2 emissions of vehicles over fuel consumption. CO2g/km for vehicles doesn't make a lot of sense to the the average buyer, except tell them whether they'll get clobbered or not for the CO2 scaled annual VED (road tax in old money). At lest fuel consumption figures tell the proper story of how far a car will go on a gallon of fuel. The two figures are directly linked so why not tell people the standards that make sense.

If we can take forward sustainable ways of energy production and maximise efficiency (reasonably) then reductions in CO2 should follow suit, so the focus needs to shift.

Energy security and costs matter more to the public who are increasingly suffering from scaremongering CO2 fatigue - I'm not saying it is not a problem (the jury is still out for me on this one) but then many are becoming a bit sick and hence immune to the more hysterical reports that are now in the news daily and the patronisation and nannying that goes along with it on reducing your footprint and so on. In the good old days it was about saving energy and money and I would say that it makes more sense in these times. Perhps the recession is one of the main reasons that emissions have fallen, alongside some improvements in efficiency.

Sulleny, Stan/ExDemo,

Don't look at just the US, look at what other nations' involvement would result in.

From the MIT Energy Initiative Study;

http://web.mit.edu/mitei/research/spotlights/emissions-bills.html

"An MIT analysis of seven climate-change bills now being considered by Congress shows that adopting any of them would cut the nation’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions significantly from a business-as-usual trajectory. The analysis includes additional positive news: the costs to the economy of even the most stringent bill would not substantially dampen economic growth over the five decades covered by the analysis."

"The results show that all of the bills would reduce GHG emissions in the US well below the doubling that the model predicts will occur by 2050 if no action is taken. The more ambitious proposals could limit global temperature rise by 2100 to about 2 degrees C above current levels—about half the projected rise if no action is taken—but only if other nations, including developing nations, also strongly control their GHG emissions."

Scott,

If we use less energy, our energy security posture would improve proportionally, especially concerning transportation, as we would not be as dependent on foreign sources. But don't take my word for it; listen to people I'm sure you trust;
http://www.secureenergy.org/site/page.php?node=364&id=100

ExDemo,

US forests sequester only 15% of US co2 emissions.
http://www.epa.gov/sequestration/faq.html#6

Where is your source for the claim that it is more than 100%?

Keen observation, there could be a correlation. Every time there is an economic contraction (1992, 2002, 2008) there is a reduction in CO2 emissions.

The boreal forest is the largest terrestrial carbon sink on the planet.

MarkBC,

I already asked ExDemo for his (her?) sources 2 days ago. Don't wait for it. The claims are obviously a fabrication.