Life Cycle Assessment of Chinese Aquaculture Reveals that the Demand for Flavor-enhancing Amino Acids Has Driven a Multi-decade Escalation in N2O Emission Intensity

Aquaculture is a rapidly growing but underrecognized global nitrous oxide (N₂O) source. As the world's largest producer of aquaculture, China’s mitigation strategies are pivotal for global climate goals and sustainable food systems. This dataset describes the long-term (1980-2022) N2O emissions from Chinese aquaculture system, which is evaluated by cradle-to-grave Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), integrating species-specific emission factors and provincial level data. This dataset includes provincial production of aquacultural species in China, emission factors used for LCA, N2O emissions from raw material phase (S1), aquaculture phase (S2), storage and distribution phase (S3), usage phase (S4), waste and wastewater phase (S5), as well as N2O mitigation potential under different mitigation scenarios.