$10 trillion. That’s the economic damage caused by U.S. greenhouse gas emissions since 1990, according to a Stanford University study published this week in Nature.

The figure is staggering. But broken down, it’s even more revealing: roughly $3 trillion of that damage landed on American soil, while $1.4 trillion hit Europe. Developing nations bore disproportionate pain relative to their economies—$500 billion in India, $330 billion in Brazil.

The methodology is straightforward, if grim. Researchers Marshall Burke, Solomon Hsiang, and Noah Diffenbaugh calculated what economists call “loss and damage”—harm that can’t be prevented by cutting emissions or adapting to warming. They traced emissions back to source countries since 1990—around the time the United Nations adopted its first global climate treaty—and modeled how accumulated warming has dragged down economic growth.

“If you warm people up a little bit, we see very clear historical evidence, you grow a little bit less quickly,” Burke told The Guardian. “It’s like death by a thousand cuts.”

China, now the world’s largest annual emitter, ranks second in historical damage at $9 trillion since 1990. Saudi Aramco alone—the largest corporate emitter—accounted for $3 trillion in damages from 1988 to 2015 emissions. If those emissions remain in the atmosphere through century’s end, the damage could rise to $64 trillion.

The research arrives as developing nations push wealthier countries for climate reparations through international “loss and damage” funds. The United States has historically resisted legal liability for its emissions. The Trump administration has since withdrawn from such agreements entirely.

The numbers, the researchers note, are conservative. They don’t capture biodiversity loss, cultural displacement, or the full weight of sea-level rise. The actual bill is likely higher.

Sources