What's the true size of your carbon footprint?

More and more Americans are taking responsibility for their personal contribution to global climate change by driving fuel efficient cars, insulating their homes and switching to energy efficient lighting and household appliances.

However, even someone who has gone to the extremes of traveling only on foot or bicycle and forsaking home heating, cooling, lighting, food refrigeration and cooking will likely shrink their carbon footprint by only about a third. That’s because roughly two-thirds of Americans’ greenhouse gas emissions are embedded instead in consumption of other goods and services, according to a recent analysis by the Center for Global Development, a non-profit policy research organization.

Most of us attribute our greenhouse gas footprint to the easily discerned energy we consume for personal transportation and home utilities. Yet these so-called “direct” emissions account for just 36% of the average American’s annual greenhouse gas emissions, which are equivalent to 21.8 tons of carbon dioxide.

The remaining 64% of greenhouse gas emissions are “indirect” and produced during the manufacture and production of literally everything else we consume, such as food, shelter, clothing, furniture, cars, bicycles, appliances, electronics, pets, toys, tools, cleaning supplies, medications, toiletries, entertainment and air travel. The fact that indirect emissions typically take place somewhere distant and out of our sight, like in a factory overseas and during transport of products to the point of sale, underlies our lack of connection to them.

Looking at the whole greenhouse gas picture

To calculate direct and indirect emissions, the Center for Global Development broke down all household expenditures into 52 categories using a representative database of U.S. household spending for 2008-2012 from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Existing life-cycle studies of the greenhouse gas intensity of items in a given spending category allowed estimation of the emissions per dollar spent in each category. 

Using U.S. Census Bureau survey information then enabled center to figure how per person greenhouse gas emissions vary with factors like income, population density, ZIP code and even congressional district.

Key findings included how income and geographic region impact emissions. Whether people identify as Republican or Democrat made little difference.

Per person emissions increased with income, from the lowest quintile (20%) income bracket to the highest quintile. Compared to a person in the bottom quintile, the greenhouse gas  footprint of someone in the top quintile was, on average, about three times larger, and the average footprint of the wealthiest 2% of Americans was more than four times greater.  Importantly, indirect emissions contributed the lion’s share to these differences.

Greenhouse gas emissions are highest in suburbs

This income effect on indirect emissions partly explains why per capita greenhouse gas emissions are overall highest in U.S. suburbs, moderate in rural regions and lowest in high density urban areas. The inefficiency of suburban housing (fewer people in larger homes) and transportation (longer commutes and reliance on personal autos) also contribute.

Regarding the relatively low greenhouse gas footprint of urbanites, the center states:

"The unambiguously lowest [greenhouse gas] footprints are found in places with both high density and lower incomes and consumption. That is, where the energy efficiency benefits of density are not offset by higher incomes and a resulting increase in indirect emissions."

This study’s illumination of the contribution of affluence and indirect emissions to climate change adds weight to Pope Francis’ momentous June encyclical on caring for the environment in which he addresses the role of a culture of consumptive excess in all manner of environmental degradations, including climate change.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama is also calling for action on climate change and led a panel on the subject at UC Irvine on July 7 as part of his Global Compassion Summit.

While the pope and the Dalai Lama agree that it is the responsibility of individuals as well as nations to do what is needed to address climate change, any notion that coaxing individuals to reign in their consumer excesses could suffice to reduce greenhouse gases enough to thwart climate change would be naïve, to say the least. Federal action is needed.

What about a national carbon tax?

Enter the national carbon tax. It is designed to place a price on all domestic sources of CO2 emissions with border adjustments to spur other nations to do the same. It would inherently provide the free market incentives to drastically cut both direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions in a timely and sustainable manner. A simple legislative proposal for a carbon tax, with dividends put directly back in the pockets of consumers, has in fact already been crafted by the non-partisan Citizens’ Climate Lobby.

When asked if “the federal government should act to limit the amount of greenhouse gases U.S. businesses put out,” 78% said yes in a nationwide survey recently conducted jointly by Stanford University and Resources for the Future.

All that’s needed now is the political will in Congress to act responsibly to insure our children inherit a livable world.

Sarah Mosko is an activist with the Angeles Chapter. Read more environmental articles by her at www.BoogieGreen.com.