Global CO2 emissions about 2.6 pct down in 2009-IEA

LONDON, Sept 21 (Reuters) - Global emissions of the commonest man-made greenhouse gas carbon dioxide will fall by about 2.6 percent in 2009, the steepest fall in at least 40 years, the International Energy Agency forecast on Monday.

"The biggest fall (in about 40 years) was in 1981, at -1.3 percent, after oil price shocks and economic troubles," said Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency.

"We estimate this year the fall will be around twice that," he told Reuters.

"We have looked country by country at power, coal, oil and gas consumption for the last eight to eight and a half months and we estimate what could happen in the next three months," he said, referring to IEA analysis of both OECD and non-OECD countries.