Studies and empirics prove that universal decoupling is occurring—prefer a wider scope.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), universal carbon dioxide-greenhouse gas related emissions shows some stability in 2015 at approximately 32.1 Gt for the second year in a row, validating the decoupling of global greenhouse gas emissions and economic growth (Enerdata, 2015; Itskos et al., 2016). The stalling of global emissions is no surprise, as this is in line with the slowing trend in annual emission growth over the past three years, starting from 2.0% in 2013 to 1.1% in 2014 and further down to 0.1% in 2015. A similar trend of declining growth in global emissions could also be seen from 2010 to 2012, starting from 5.7% down to 0.7%. It is debatable whether the plateaued emission level will continue and results from structural changes (Jackson et al., 2016; Qi et al., 2016; Green and Stern, 2016). In 2009, a stronger global downward trend of 1.0% was recorded, compared to 2008 levels, but this was due to the global economic downturn. Stalling in emissions is not coupled with the GDP trend, as global GDP kept up with an annual growth of 3.0% in 2015 compared to 2014. A more structural change with a shift away from carbon-intensive activities, particularly in China but also in the United States, contributed considerably to this trend. This achievement was made possible through the global investment in energy efficiency which increased by 6% in 2015 (IEA, 2010) and the rise in the proportion of renewables in the generation of power. It is estimated that the share of renewables was around 90 percent of the latest power generation in year 2015, with power from wind alone responsible for over 50 percent.