Six-dimensional emission-exposure mismatch in global tropical cyclone risk: a structural asymmetry across distinct emission and production metrics

Whether countries that contribute most to anthropogenic forcing are also the most physically exposed to tropical cyclones has not been quantified across multiple emission and production dimensions simultaneously. We combine hurricane-strength exposure counts from IBTrACS v04r01 (1991–2025; 22,803 six-hourly fixes at or above 64 kt from 1,466 storms) with six national-level metrics: cumulative CO2 since 1750, oil production, coal production, livestock CH4 emissions, fossil-fuel power plant capacity, and MODIS fire-point density. Exposure is assigned using a fixed 300 km coastal buffer applied identically to all countries as a reproducible storm-centre proximity window rather than a modelled wind footprint; the threshold was specified before the emission–exposure comparison and was not tuned to maximize mismatch. The six metrics were selected for public availability, global country coverage, cross-country comparability, and representation of distinct accounting horizons and source sectors rather than repeated measures of one emissions category. On a 50-country panel, Spearman rank correlations between emission or production share and cyclone-exposure share are non-significant in all six dimensions (rho = +0.065 to +0.237, all p > 0.09), indicating no systematic tendency for high-emission or high-production countries to also be highly exposed. Gini coefficients of absolute share gaps range from 0.578 to 0.729, and Top-10 emitter versus Top-10 exposure overlap ranges from 0/10 for fire points to 5/10 for cumulative CO2. Spatially, positive gaps are concentrated mainly in large continental industrial and production economies, whereas negative gaps are concentrated in cyclone-prone coastal and island regions across the western North Pacific, South Pacific, North Atlantic and Caribbean, the Australian region, and the South Indian Ocean. Illustrative positive gaps include the United States for cumulative CO2 (+26.5 percentage points), China for coal (+45.6 pp), and India for livestock CH4 (+16.5 pp); Australia, Mexico, Japan, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Fiji show negative gaps across all six dimensions. The convergence of six independently constructed metrics onto the same broad mismatch pattern is consistent with a structural physical-exposure asymmetry rather than a metric-specific artefact. This analysis quantifies physical exposure only and does not estimate damage, impact, or vulnerability.