a 1.183 tonne happy medium?
If it were up to me, I wouldn’t spend my time or money on a long-haul flight from Heathrow to JFK. In the worst of times, I’d move cities or change my job. Sometimes, you don’t plan to spend 1.183 tonnes of carbon. As an entrepreneur and social innovator, I’m not yet an asset to the Her Majesty’s Treasury and so therefore must pass go and not collect my $200.
What does that mean? I’ve got to go to my home country (USA), to reapply for the Tier-1 Post Study Work visa to fly back to London once I’ve received final notification from University College London’s School of Slavonic Studies that I’ve been awarded a degree of the Political Economy of Russia and East Europe. To the credit of the UK Government, I did reapply once before for a visa to resit an exam.
A friend specialises in no-fly travel, Jaime Andrews of Loco2, recommended I take a cargo ship and I thought, “whoopie! An excuse to take a cargo ship!”. Nevermind the fact it takes two weeks to reserve a ticket, and it’s over 1000 squids per way. “Damn!” That sure isn’t going to happen. I’ve been recommended to leave before the weekend. The longer I wait the less probability of visa approval later.
A happy medium? Maybe offset the 1.183 tonnes British Airways says I’m going to use by flying to JFK? Or maybe, in 2009 I can save up the money to ride a cargo ship over, whose impact is far less than flying. My choice? Working within legality and monetary constraints, I’ll fly (oh my god, I’ve said it!) from London Heathrow to New York City and take a fabulous Amtrak train from New York City to Chicago, saving around 20% of my carbon emissions over flying. Amtrak even has a sustainable cartoon champion called Arte, what a handsome greenie!
Is that really enough? The world is waiting for a significant change; we’ve only got 100 months until god knows WHAT happens and I hop on a plane. The website is now ticking at me and I’m feeling slightly guilty. It would take significant changes to our lives to reduce carbon to offset a long-haul plane trip. And even then! I’m not sure being vegan, shopping local, decreasing our house’s thermastat by 3-5 degrees, using less water and walking more would impact our footprint as much as a long-haul flight.
But what about just knowing, better yet, picturing in my head, how much carbon I’m using daily. Weekly. Monthly. Yearly! Carbon calculators can do this, although imperfectly. According to Low Carbon Community guru Tracey Todhunter, it’s better to calculate and reduce your carbon footprint than worry about differences between carbon calculators (they might be around 10-20% differences). Again, from Jaime Andrews, the Carbon Account helps you measure and reduce your carbon footprint.
So now you’ve read about my trials and tribulations, why not calculate and reduce your carbon footprint with me?
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