Worldwide carbon dioxide pollution jumped 2 percent last year, most of the increase coming from China, despite the economic slump that expected to lower emissions, a new study found.

The growth in emissions since 2000 is almost entirely driven by the growth in China, according to data from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory and published in the journal Nature Geoscience.

Carbon dioxide emissions, the chief man-made greenhouse gas, come from the burning of coal, oil, natural gas and also from the production of cement, which is a significant pollution factor in China. Worldwide emissions rose 671 million more tons from 2007 to 2008. Nearly three-quarters of that increase came from China.

The 2008 increase is smaller than normal for this decade, according to the study. Typically pollution has grown by 3.6 percent, whereas last year it grew by less than 3 percent.