I thought my life was pretty environmentally sound. My family lives in New York City, so we don't own a car. I take public transportation or walk. We live in a one bedroom apartment, rather than a McMansion. I work at home so I don't have to commute. I recycle newspapers, re-use plastic bags, and even, heaven help me, scraps of tin foil. I turn out the lights when I leave a room. I like to buy locally grown produce, purchase organic food at Whole Foods or Trader Joe's, and my son even used chlorine-free diapers for a while.
But, like a Republican Senator with a men's bathroom habit, it turns out my family has a secret sin. Since January, I have flown seven round trip short-haul flights, mostly for work. I've also indulged in three medium-haul flights to and from Europe or California, and one doozy of a trip to South Africa. My proportion of those flights added 11,800 kg of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, according to the calculator at Carbonfootprint.com. That's the equivalent of driving a gas guzzling SUV more than 20,000 miles.
And that's just me. My husband has probably traveled to Europe a dozen times for work since January. That's added 15,600 kg of carbon dioxide to our planet, which is the equivalent of driving almost 30,000 miles in an SUV. Add in his South African flight, our planned trip to India later this year, and my four-month-old son's planet-busting visits to his grandparents', and we may as well be torching the polar ice caps ourselves.
In other words, we are environmental hypocrites. But we're far from the only ones, as our country's new obsession with carbon footprint calculators is revealing. All this new data on metric tons of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere by human activities is bringing new meaning to the old adage about those without sin casting the first stones. The biggest culprits in our current environmental mess are not who we think they are. Fortunately, the sooner we realize this, and figure out what the really big sins are, the sooner we can get around to actually saving the earth.
While the truly environmentally aware have been thinking about carbon dioxide and global warming for decades, most of us have only learned about the more hip concept of "carbon footprints" in the last year or two. To learn your own level of naughtiness, you can visit any of the calculators, and plug in data on your living, driving, and traveling habits. The calculators spit out how many metric tons of greenhouse gases you and your family are responsible for. Those who want to atone can then purchase carbon credits through participating vendors. These credits pay for projects that remove an equivalent amount of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. For instance, CarbonFootprint.com quoted me a rate of about $170 for offsetting 12 metric tons of carbon via a reforestation project in Kenya.
Yes, on some level, the whole exercise bears a disconcerting resemblance to the indulgences of the medieval Catholic Church. Certainly, now is the time to get involved in Third World tree planting if you want to make a quick buck. But these calculators serve a useful purpose beyond raising money for environmental groups. As they've gained popularity, they've revealed some fascinating, if inconvenient, truths.
For starters, outward signs of piety, such as purchasing bamboo floors, do very little to fight global warming. Indeed, if that bamboo has to be flown from Asia, you may very well be behind on the deal.
Second, the worldliness many more progressive types celebrate is actually horrible for the planet. Even some environmental organizations are guilty of encouraging profligate carbon-producing behavior. The Sierra Club, for instance, advertises many fabulous sounding trips, such as "Best of Bhutan: Trekking, Buddhism and Birds" or "The Antarctic: Nature's Frozen Playground." Nature lovers can see "Huge colonies of squawking Gentoo and chinstrap penguins raise their chicks on rock nests, while fur seals bask in the sun." Unfortunately, shuttling 15 Americans and their gear to Antarctica does more to harm these penguins' and seals' habitats than if all these travelers drove Hummers to Disneyland instead. By precluding the possibility of long-haul flights, the oft-mocked American habit of not holding a valid passport turns out to be the most environmentally friendly decision anyone could make.
Of course, in our connected world, nixing business and pleasure travel entirely is neither desirable nor wise, and to their credit, many environmental and international travel organizations are purchasing carbon credits to offset the damage these trips cause. Businesses that spawn a lot of business travel seem to be a bit slower about purchasing offsets. But perhaps this will eventually happen, too. Maybe.
What I do know is that carbon footprint calculators are changing the nature of the debate by showing which decisions matter most. Installing an environmentally correct light bulb is one thing. Driving a hybrid is also nice. But asking your direct reports to use videoconferencing for your monthly brainstorming sessions will reduce your carbon footprint a lot more. If you're the jet-setting type, converting those four weekends in Paris into one 10 day trip will also make a big difference. And maybe we can finally stop harping about the guy who drives 20 miles to work because he wants to live in a decent house in the suburbs, rather than in a cramped apartment by a light rail stop. In the grand scheme of global warming, he's really not that bad.