The Carbon Footprint of Everything

Mike Berners-Lee

• Publisher: Greystone Books
• Year: 2022
• ISBN:
  9781771645775
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Ciencias biológicas
• Subtopic: Calentamiento global y cambio climático

"I can't remember the last time I read a book that was more fascinating and useful and enjoyable." —Bill Bryson

Reduce your carbon footprint and understand the issue with this " up-to-date life guide for carbon-conscious readers."— Kirkus

• Calculate your carbon footprint: with an item-by-item breakdown.
• Meet your company's carbon goals: using the latest research.
• Covid-19 and the carbon battle: understand the new global supply chain.

The Carbon Footprint of Everything breaks items down by the amount of carbon they produce, creating a calorie guide for the carbon-conscious. With engaging writing, leading carbon expert Mike Berners-Lee shares new carbon calculations based on recent research. He considers the impact of the pandemic on the carbon battle—especially the embattled global supply chain—and adds items we didn't consider a decade ago, like bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

Supported by solid research, cross-referenced with other expert sources, illustrated with easy-to-follow charts and graphs, and written with Berners-Lee's trademark sense of humor, The Carbon Footprint of Everything should be on everyone's bookshelf.

The Carbon Footprint of Everything is an extensively revised and updated edition of How Bad Are Bananas.

500 grams to 1 kilo (1.1 to 2.2 pounds)

An ice cream or popsicle

70 g CO₂e an 80 g popsicle from the supermarket

140 g CO₂e an 80 g ice cream bar

500 g CO₂e a big dairy chocolate chip ice cream from an ice cream truck

I throw my hands in the air—the figures above are back-of-the-envelope guesstimates. But they come from a broad understanding of the footprints of different food ingredients, transportation impacts, and mobile refrigeration.

So, a popsicle is essentially frozen sugary water, and in a supermarket the refrigeration is likely to be relatively efficient. If you buy a box and store them in your own freezer, that will increase the footprint a little. As would an electric ice cream truck.

A traditional ice cream truck’s footprint is much higher for three reasons: it’s bigger, the ice cream is dairy based (with the associated footprint from the dairy industry), and it’s kept cold in a less efficient mobile refrigeration unit, often belching out diesel fumes.

Chocolate chips make the footprint of an ice cream even higher, but I think we can all agree it’s worth it.

Driving a mile

260 g CO₂e in a mid-sized five-door electric car

290 g CO₂e in a small car doing a steady 60 mph (100 kph)

630 g CO₂e in an average US car at 25 miles per gallon

1.26 kg (2.7 lbs) CO₂e in a Range Rover Sport, new but not looked after, doing 90 mph (140 kph)

>Driving a car the US average annual distance of 13,500 miles can use from 70 to 340 percent of the 5-ton lifestyle

My numbers are higher than those you normally see for driving. That is partly because I am including the emissions from the extraction, refining, and transportation of fuel as well as the burning of it. Even more importantly, I am factoring in the manufacture and maintenance of the vehicle itself.

As a rule of thumb, about half of the carbon impact of car travel comes out of the exhaust pipe.¹ A few percent come from the fuel before it is burned (see A 50-liter (13-gallon) tank of gas, p. 129). The rest, typically 40 percent of the footprint, is associated with the manufacture and maintenance of the car. Big, expensive, new cars have more of their embodied emissions attributable to each mile of driving. An older car that is still fairly efficient could beat a new efficient vehicle by virtue of having had its embodied footprint written off (see A new car, p. 157).

The electric car is a clear winner, but still has a substantial footprint because of the embodied carbon and the footprint of the electricity.

Among gas-powered cars, the low end of the scale above is calculated for a well-maintained low-emission vehicle (such as a Fiat 500 or Ford Fiesta) traveling at a steady 60 mph. My own Peugeot 107 can do 75 miles to the gallon under these conditions. With four people, the carbon comes out at 73 g CO₂e per person per mile.

At the high end of the scale, we have a single person in an SUV that looks more like a tank, cruising at 90 mph or driving aggressively in urban conditions. In these conditions, a vehicle of this type may achieve as little as 18 miles per gallon.

The choice of a new car is crucial to your carbon footprint. Vehicle emissions have not decreased at anything like the scale we might have hoped for ten years ago, and the reason for that is too many people buy SUVs rather than fuel-efficient cars. This is a disastrous fashion: big SUVs are totally unnecessary for most people. Any supposed safety advantage in a crash comes at the expense of whoever you crash into. They should be taxed very heavily indeed. If you are replacing a car, take the plunge and go electric (and not bigger than you need); you’ll reduce your maintenance and running costs enormously, as well as your emissions. Almost nobody who goes electric regrets doing so.

But it’s not just what model you drive that matters. Here are nine good ways to reduce the carbon footprint of your car use:

•Put more people in the car or even join a ride-sharing service. A car can compete in emissions with train travel if you are avoiding four separate journeys. Typical saving: 50–80 percent.

•Look after your car so that it will do at least 200,000 miles in its lifetime and runs as efficiently as it can. Typical saving: 30 percent compared with the average (see A new car, p. 157).

•Accelerate and decelerate gently, avoiding braking as much as possible. Typical saving: up to 20 percent in urban conditions.

•Drive at 60 mph on highways. Typical saving: 15 percent compared with 70 mph.

•Keep the windows up when driving fast, and the air conditioning off. Typical saving: 2 percent.

•Keep the tires at the right pressure. Typical saving: 1 percent.²

•Avoid rush hour (see A rush-hour car commute, p. 114).

•Drive safely (see A car crash, p. 170).

•Use the train, bus, or bike if traveling alone. Typical saving: 40–98 percent (see New York City to Niagara Falls and back, p. 124).

A latte (or a tea or coffee)

22 g CO₂e black tea

47 g CO₂e tea with soy milk

49 g CO₂e black coffee, instant

71 g CO₂e tea with cow’s milk

87 g CO₂e black coffee (drip, Americano, or filter)

288 g CO₂e large oat milk latte

308 g CO₂e large soy milk latte

552 g CO₂e large cow’s milk latte

+ 110 g CO₂e for a typical disposable cup³

>A cup of black tea is low carbon . . . but a cow’s milk latte every day could make up 4 percent of the 5-ton lifestyle

The shock in the figures above is the milk. If you take your tea with milk, and you boil only the water you need, then the milk accounts for three-quarters of the total footprint (see A pint (16 oz) of milk, p. 83). The obvious way to slash the footprint of your tea is reduce the amount of milk, switch to soy or oat milk, or drink your tea without milk.

Coffee also has a significant footprint,⁴ much higher per cup than tea. Instant has a lower footprint than ground because a factory is more e...