Personal Carbon Footprint – What’s the Point of It?

With all the news about climate change it can be confusing to know just how much a single person can make a difference. Using a personal carbon footprint calculator can give you a very general and confusing idea of your perosnal carbon footprint. When I calculated mine I was addicted to reading the details of each metric and I will share a summary with you now.

A personal carbon footprint is a calculation of the amount of greenhouse gases (measured in CO2e) that are emitted due to the actions of a single person. It’s purpose is to highlight personal choices that people make that contribute to an increase their carbon footprint.

Let’s break it down to understand the details of our personal emissions.

Overall Emissions Breakdown for a Single Person

I just calculated my personal carbon emissions on a few different online calculators. I would consider myself to be very conscious of the choices that I make. I try to make up for my love of air travel by eating less meat (never beef), shopping at zero waste stores, always bringing my own bags and food containers, backyard composting, working from home and doing all the energy efficiency upgrades to my home.

I managed to make it just under the national average for Canada (which is one of the worst in the world). According to the calculation from carbonfootprint.com, my carbon foot print is 14.88 metric tons CO2e and the global goal is 2 metric tons by 2050.

When looking at the results for my personal carbon footprint the areas break down like this:

This breakdown will be very different for everyone but I put it here to show you the components. I think the breakdown would be similar for people in my middle class community in Vancouver Canada. Most people I know travel across oceans regularly, drive to their jobs and activities, eat similar food and heat their homes.

My home uses gas and electricity which takes up about a quarter of my emissions. My car is at 22.2% which surprised me considering I do not have a daily commute but I do drive to the store and drop kids at activities. My flights are not surprising because we go on a family holiday each year on a different continent – I can work on that. Food is only 11.1% for a less than average meat eater. The “other” breaks down to things like clothing, entertainment, restaurants, technology and telecom services.

This breakdown definitely gives me something to think about. There are many great sites that give tips on how to reduce these numbers, it is time I take action. Maybe our international family holidays are over!

Wealthier families have a larger footprint. Households that earn more than $150,000 annually have a carbon footprint just over 3 times that of a family with an income of $30-40k. I can see why, bigger houses, more cars, more travel.

Food has a Footprint before we Eat it

Let’s start with the smallest on my carbon footprint: food. The calculator I used asked me how much I spend in a year on food and drink products and to rate myself in terms of meat consumption. I selected “medium meat eater” as we eat vegetarian 3 times a week and chicken the other days.

There is much more involved in the emissions for foods than whether or not you eat meat. In fact, growing and storing all food causes 83% of the emissions from food production.

Obviously the emissions involved in growing livestock is much greater than growing vegetables because first you have to grow the food that the livestock eats. Not to mention, the livestock makes their own gas emissions that are not negligible. According to a study co-authored by Professor John Williams, from the University of Adelaide’s School of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, livestock produce 37% of the methane emissions resulting from human activity.

Livestock production is said to contributes 18% of all greenhouse gas emissions. This is partially because we first clear cut large areas (plants that would have removed some emissions), to grow the food to feed the animals.

On top of that, cows are grown for both beef and dairy products so simply cutting out beef is not enough if you still eat dairy products.

When food is grown in an area that is not native to the plant, hot houses may be used which require power. Also growing food that isn’t native might require fertilizer which produces CO2e gasses.

Sustainable and organic food are not always the same. Sustainable takes into account the economic, social and ecological factors whereas organic focuses on human health. Organic food is not always low emission food.

Another factor that dictates the amount of emissions of food is the amount that it is processed and packaged. Less processed foods have a smaller carbon footprint. Buying package free foods is better as well because the disposal of packaging contributes to greenhouse gas emissions.

How we prepare our food is another factor for emissions. The raw food diet uses less power than diets with cooking/baking/BBQing.

Transportation

Although air travel only accounts for 5% of the total carbon emissions in the world it has potential to grow rapidly. This value increased by 32% between 2013 and 2018. The improvements in fuel efficiency of the airplanes cannot keep up with the growing number of flights taken.

Factors that contribute to an increase of emissions on a flight:

• airplane efficiency (choose flights that are on newer planes)
• first class or business class seats cause 4 times more than economy because they take up more space and weight and usually the section is not full
• luggage weight
• flights with several stopovers are worse, try to chose direct flights
• flights during the night 2 times worse because of the effects of the contrails they leave which trap heat

The internet has made the world seem much smaller and the desire to travel to see it is increasing at an alarming rate. The emissions from air travel is expected to grow more than 300% by 2050 causing unsustainable emissions.

Home Emissions

The carbon calculators that I tested asked questions about gas and electrical consumption over a year. Logging into my utility’s website made it very easy to find this information. In fact, both utilities have amazing charts and information detailing my consumption and comparisons year to year.

You can clearly see from the graphs on my monthly utility usage that heating the home accounts for most of the emissions. We have a highly efficient furnace and some electric heat in our basement.

Canada (with only 30 million people) uses just as much energy as the entire continent of Africa (with 700 million). I guess my idea to travel there to see how they do it isn’t going to fly!

A Surprising Way to Reduce your Carbon Footprint Significantly

A new recommendation for how we can reduce our personal carbon footprint is to have one less child. This can reduce your emissions by 58.5 metric tons of CO2. If you compare that to living car-free a reduction by 2.4 metric tons of CO2 or eating a plant based diet only .82 metric tons.

Some environmentalists are taking this to heart and not having any children. For me, it is too late, I’ve already had two but I will do my best to learn with them how to live a sustainable life.

How Can I Reduce my Carbon Footprint?

If you’ve already had all the children you are going to have, the best way to reduce your personal carbon footprint is to travel smart. Avoid flights when possible, try living car-free (and that doesn’t mean Uber everywhere!). Biking, walking, busing, trains are best. Make sure your car is efficient if you have one with well inflated tires.

If possible, buy green energy.

In Canada, you can purchase green energy through companies like Bullfrog Power. They charge a monthly fee to ensure that the electricity and/or natural gas you receive to your home is “green”. For $33CAD / month you can reduce your personal carbon footprint by more than 5 tonnes/year. They support green energy projects across Canada.

In the USA, at least 50% of customers can purchase renewable electricity from their utility company directly. They also have an option to purchase clean power through various programs like Green Pricing.

Wash your clothes in cold water and hang them to dry. Make sure you are using energy efficient light bulbs.

Consider a zero waste lifestyle or if you have materials to be recycled, recycle them.

Avoid beef and dairy products. Try to eat local sustainable foods preferably raw vegan foods.

It is a long list, challenge yourself to try these things for at least a set amount of time to see what happens. In theory, all of these things are said to improve your life while saving the planet!