What's your carbon footprint?

**Chris** · 23-10-2007, 11:15

http://actonco2.direct.gov.uk/index.html

The Directgov website now has a carbon footprint calculator. I've just calculated our full household footprint, including all heating, lighting, appliances and travel. The results are shocking:

Your CO2 result is 27.1 tonnes per year
Your target footprint total is 21.68 tonnes per year
The national average total is 10.2 tonnes per year
CO2 emissions from all three areas of your lifestyle (tonnes per year):

Home 17.76
Appliances 3.79
Travel 5.55

This is because our house is heated by an open coal fire with a back boiler.

The good news is, we have just applied for a grant to install a biomass boiler and solar panels. I completed the same suvey assuming these technologies were in place, and our total footprint reduced by a whopping 17 tonnes to a little over 9 tonnes!

So, everyone, have a go at this and tell us your results - complete the full household survey if you possibly can.

The poll above is for results of full household footprints, please don't vote with your personal results as it will skew the results of the poll.

Feel free to post whatever results you get in the thread though.

http://actonco2.direct.gov.uk/index.html

danielf · 23-10-2007, 11:22

ahem. OK, this thread has a poll, but we had one of these slightly over a month ago:

http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/22...n-are-you.html

**Chris** · 23-10-2007, 11:25

Ah well. As you say, there's a poll this time. I'd merge the threads but then my poll instructions would end up down the bottom somewhere - so I'll close the older thread.

brundles · 23-10-2007, 11:34

Your CO2 result is 9.13 tonnes per year
Your target footprint total is 7.3 tonnes per year:
Home - 2.14
Appliances - 1.79
Travel - 5.2

It's lower than I thought it would be given the TV and electric oven!

peanut · 23-10-2007, 11:42

Could you add a "I don't really care" to the poll? Just to balance it out.

I don't and can't do anything about China, stop rainforests being cut down, Govenments using it to scare people so they can tax you on the back of it etc etc etc..... I'm sure everything we do (joe public) in a week is cancelled out in a blink of an eye by the main causes.

So when it comes down to little ol' me, I recycle what I can, mainly just to keep the council happy and to even out the rubbish in the bins each fortnight. I really think it's all abit OTT if you ask me.

Knobbly · 23-10-2007, 11:44

10.85 Tonnes per year, do I care? No, the government need to put more effort into sorting out China's and the USA's emmissions than worrying about ours which are pitifully low in comparison.

danielf · 23-10-2007, 11:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Knobbly

10.85 Tonnes per year, do I care? No, the government need to put more effort into sorting out China's and the USA's emmissions than worrying about ours which are pitifully low in comparison.

Erm, and the US and China go: we are small compared to the rest of the world put together. So nothing happens while everybody sits there looking at each other.

Knobbly · 23-10-2007, 11:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by danielf

Erm, and the US and China go: we are small compared to the rest of the world put together.

How does that work then?

danielf · 23-10-2007, 11:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by Knobbly

How does that work then?

Same as your reasoning really: point the finger at others without taking responsibility yourself.

**Rob** · 23-10-2007, 12:02

Hmm, better than I thought - 9.99 tonnes per year. On the other hand that is just me as I'm a single person household. Maybe that's not so good then

fireman328 · 23-10-2007, 12:07

Size 8 in Boots, depends on make of shoes

Knobbly · 23-10-2007, 12:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by danielf

Same as your reasoning really: point the finger at others without taking responsibility yourself.

Sorry, your point makes absolutely no sense. Getting the two main contributers to CO2 to cut their emissions is going to be FAR more constructive than people in the UK cutting their piddly amounts in a pathetic attempt to make up for what the rest of the worlds industrialised nations pump into the atmosphere.

punky · 23-10-2007, 12:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by danielf

Erm, and the US and China go: we are small compared to the rest of the world put together. So nothing happens while everybody sits there looking at each other.

The US goes We'll do our bit, but we expect everyone else do there's. They duly drop their emissions, whilst China just gives everyone the finger.

Quote:

Originally Posted by http://www.mnp.nl/en/dossiers/Climatechange/moreinfo/Chinanowno1inCO2emissionsUSAinsecondposition.html

Total fossil CO2 emissions of China increased in 2006 by 8.7%. In the USA, according to the BP data CO2 emissions decreased in 2006 by 1.4% relative to 2005. Fossil CO2 emissions of the European Union countries “EU-15” remained almost constant in 2006

so:

China: increases and becomes top polluter with no less than an 8% increase)
US decreases
EU: constant

And when you take per-capita the US is lower than Australia and Canada. China with large population of peasant farmers benefits nicely for that.

The most polluted city in the US, LA (and California in general) has the most harshest environmental laws going. Meanwhile Beijing is too polluted for athletes and asthmatics.

Another nice statistic from that article. 16 / 20 of the worlds most polluted cities are in China.

Unfortunately everyone is too scared to act on China, even for their appalling, continuing human rights record so I don't see the environment improving regardless what everyone does.

Meanwhile, calculators like this are notoriously inaccurate but mine works out as:

Home: 7.04
Appliances 1.72
Travel 6.33
Total: 15.09 for a household of 2. I have no idea how wildly estimates things for which I said "don't know" so it could be much less than that.

danielf · 23-10-2007, 12:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by Knobbly

Sorry, your point makes absolutely no sense. Getting the two main contributers to CO2 to cut their emissions is going to be FAR more constructive than people in the UK cutting their piddly amounts in a pathetic attempt to make up for what the rest of the worlds industrialised nations pump into the atmosphere.

True, but my point is that all countries should do their share. Including China, The US and the UK. It's a global problem, it needs a global solution.

peanut · 23-10-2007, 12:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by danielf

True, but my point is that all countries should do their share. Including China, The US and the UK. It's a global problem, it needs a global solution.

You said it "should". But they don't, so what we do is cancelled out.