Carbon calculators and the fraud of 'doing your bit'
Crash | 10.02.2007 10:03 | Analysis | Climate Chaos
Using a carbon calculator reveals how little impact on climate change we can have even by radically changing our lifestyles.
There's lots of interest in carbon footprints (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_footprint) and how we can reduce it. A good start is to know the scale of your contribution to the problem - and in recent years a number of 'carbon calculators' have sprung up on the web, enabling individuals to put a rough figure to the amount of carbon they are personally responsible for producing. I'd heard that the Resurgence Carbon Calculator ( http://www.resurgence.org/carboncalculator/) was more detailed and therefore accurate than most, so I gave it a go. The conclusion I was forced to draw was that any 'lifestyle' choices we make will have only a negligible effect on our share of carbon emissions.
I was expecting to have a fairly low carbon footprint - I don't have a car, rarely fly, eat veggie, buy green electricity and save energy where I can. So I was feeling pleased when I'd reached near the end of the carbon calculator form and saw that my total so far was 3 tonnes - about a third of the UK average. But then comes the part entitled 'industry share'. This is where you add to your carbon footprint all the things society supposedly 'benefits' from...street lighting, health services, education, defence. And this raised my total up to 7.5 tonnes - over twice what I had expected.
The message from this seems to be - we can recycle all we like, we can even go and live in an eco-village, but a 60% cut in carbon emissions (the UK target) will be impossible to achieve by 'lifestyle' choices alone. It also explains why insulating your loft seems pointless when the USAF air freights toilet roll, toothbrushes and bottled water to Iraq every five minutes and when 70% of the energy generated from coal burning in power stations is lost before it reaches your home.
The only solution seems to be a complete restructuring of every aspect of society. Perhaps instead of 'offsetting emissions' or buying energy saving lightbulbs we should be giving our money and time to support the work of those that are attempting to achieve the latter.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_footprint) and how we can reduce it. A good start is to know the scale of your contribution to the problem - and in recent years a number of 'carbon calculators' have sprung up on the web, enabling individuals to put a rough figure to the amount of carbon they are personally responsible for producing. I'd heard that the Resurgence Carbon Calculator ( http://www.resurgence.org/carboncalculator/) was more detailed and therefore accurate than most, so I gave it a go. The conclusion I was forced to draw was that any 'lifestyle' choices we make will have only a negligible effect on our share of carbon emissions. I was expecting to have a fairly low carbon footprint - I don't have a car, rarely fly, eat veggie, buy green electricity and save energy where I can. So I was feeling pleased when I'd reached near the end of the carbon calculator form and saw that my total so far was 3 tonnes - about a third of the UK average. But then comes the part entitled 'industry share'. This is where you add to your carbon footprint all the things society supposedly 'benefits' from...street lighting, health services, education, defence. And this raised my total up to 7.5 tonnes - over twice what I had expected.
The message from this seems to be - we can recycle all we like, we can even go and live in an eco-village, but a 60% cut in carbon emissions (the UK target) will be impossible to achieve by 'lifestyle' choices alone. It also explains why insulating your loft seems pointless when the USAF air freights toilet roll, toothbrushes and bottled water to Iraq every five minutes and when 70% of the energy generated from coal burning in power stations is lost before it reaches your home.
The only solution seems to be a complete restructuring of every aspect of society. Perhaps instead of 'offsetting emissions' or buying energy saving lightbulbs we should be giving our money and time to support the work of those that are attempting to achieve the latter.
Crash