How Much CO2 is emitted by One Person on Earth annually?
Introduction
“Carbon footprint” is the latest buzzword among environmentalists and even among members of the general public, including the students and politicians. Carbon footprint pertains to the level of greenhouse gas emitted by people over a particular span of time. The more of these gases are emitted into the environment, the more harm they cause the environment (Olivier et al, 2014).
As per US Energy Information Administration (2012), the global average of our carbon emission is now up to 4.6 tonnes per person. The six largest emitting countries/regions (with their share in 2013 between brackets) were: Japan (4%); China (29%); the European Union (EU28) (11%); India (6%); the United States (15%); and the Russian Federation (5%) (Figure 1.1).
The common emissions of carbon dioxide generated by individuals are generated through the heating (and cooling) of homes or through transportation. More specially, the burning of oil, gas, or other types of fossil fuels results in carbon dioxide discharges. With regards to cars or airplanes, this happens directly in the ignition chamber of the engines. In this regard, their emissions are called direct emissions since they take place at the place of consumption. When we use electricity, the emissions are indirect since they take place not at the place of consumption but at the generation plant (Chan et al., 2014).
For this article, I will be calculating my personal carbon footprint. I will be capturing the entire life cycle of the various aspects of my personal consumption and will focus on my consumption in the following categories: travel, food, and housing.
I will start on my personal share of home energy use. This means that, to obtain my individual share, I would need to gather information on our home’s latest energy, divided by the number of individuals in our house. With this information, below is my calculation:
CO2 Emissions Due to Appliance Use (including cooking)
I based the 7.55 kWh/day on our latest monthly bill (January 12- February 12, 2016). This includes our appliances: Rice cooker, television, air conditioner, electric fan, mobile chargers, and laptops. Then divided it on number of persons (two) multiplied it with 365 days (for annual result) divided by 2204.6 which was taken from the EIS formula, having the result of .982 CO2 tonnes.
We do not use any coal on our household since we do not eat barbecued meats.
CO2 Emissions Due to Vehicle Use
Calculating our motorcycle carbon footprint depended on the miles/gallon and the total number of miles that I drove in any given year. Luckily, I collected all of our gas receipts and summed them up to obtain the total amount of gas used for the entire year.
Our monthly gas consumption is 171.43 Liters multiply it by 2.30 kg CO2 / L as suggested by VCA (2016).
Total private vehicle emission is 1577.14 divide by two persons, having my personal carbon emission of 788.57.
I did not include any bus travels nor train travels since I rarely commute. For my domestic flights, I estimated six to eight flights in a year (Davao – Manila flights) with 969 kilometers. Divide it by 12 months, and multiply it by 12.7 kg CO2 km (VCA, 2016). Having a total of 2049.67 as my yearly emission.
Greenhouse gas emissions of one-fourth tonne of CO2 is equivalent to one hour of flying (Olivier, 2014)
I also used the formula given by Agence Française de Développement (2011) for additional basis.
Below is the summary of my annual Carbon Footprint:
In the chart, wecan see that my transportaion has the highest carbon emission 3,627 CO2/kg or 87%, followed by my electricity usage of 554 c02/kg or 13% (whih includes electrical cooking).
Honestly, I do not recycle paper nor recycle plastics apart from bags but having this high result, I will start doing so and be more mindful in everything that I do.
I am thinking of starting at very simple things like switching the lights off if we do not really need it, controlling the thermostat of the air conditioner or by turning it off if it’s not really hot outside, unplug the unused phone chargers.
We should also avoid unnecessary use of vehicle. We will just try to walk if we are just going to buy in a nearby store so we can also exercise and have a fit lifestyle.
References
Agence Française de Développement (2011). Retrieved from
http://www.afd.fr/jahia/webdav/site/afd/shared/PORTAILS/SECTEURS/CLIMAT/pdf/Carbon%20footprint%20user%20guide%20-%2007.05.2011.pdf
Carbon Emission Calculator. (2016). Retrieved thru http://www.carbonindependent.org/.
Chan, A. et al. (2014). Electricity Price Signals and Demand Response. Retrieved from
http://www.element-energy.co.uk/wordpress/wp content/uploads/2014/07/
HEUS_Electricity_Price_Signals_and_Demand_Response_Final_Report_04_04_14.pdf
Olivier, J., et al. (2014). Trends in global CO2 emissions: 2014 Report. Retrieved
U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIS, 2012). Retrieved from
http://www.eia.gov/cfapps/ipdbproject/iedindex3.cfm?tid=90&pid=45&aid=8&cid=regions&syid=1980&eyid=2010&unit=MMTCD
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. (2011). Retrieved from
http://www3.epa.gov/carbon-footprint-calculator/
VCA Car Fuel Data. (2016). Car Fuel Consumption and CO2 Tools. Retrieved from
http://www.dft.gov.uk/vca/fcb/carfueldata-tools-redirect-page.asp
