How Far Can We Get Without Flying?

When a climate scientist decided to stop flying to cut his carbon emissions, he caught a glimpse of the post-oil future.

Peter Kalmus, at YesMagazine.org | Feb 11, 2016

Photo from Shutterstock. I’m a climate scientist who doesn’t fly. I try to avoid burning fossil fuels, because it’s clear that doing so causes real harm to humans and to nonhumans, today and far into the future. I don’t like harming others, so I don’t fly. Back in 2010, though, I was awash in cognitive dissonance. My awareness of global warming had risen to a fever pitch, but I hadn’t yet made real changes to my daily life. This disconnect made me feel panicked and disempowered. Then one evening in 2011, I gathered my utility bills and did some Internet research. I looked up the amounts of carbon dioxide emitted by burning a gallon of gasoline and a therm (about 100 cubic feet) of , I found an estimate for emissions from producing the food for a typical American diet and an estimate for generating a kilowatt-hour of electricity in California, and I averaged the Intergovernmental Panel on and Environmental Protection Agency estimates for CO2 emissions per mile from flying. With these data, I made a basic pie chart of my personal emissions for 2010. This picture came as a surprise. I’d assumed that electricity and driving were my largest sources of emissions. Instead, it turned out that the 50,000 miles I’d flown that year (two international

1 and half a dozen domestic flights, typical for postdocs in the sciences who are expected to attend conferences and meetings) utterly dominated my emissions.

YES! Infographic Hour for hour, there’s no better way to warm the planet than to fly in a plane. If you fly coach from Los Angeles to Paris and back, you’ve just emitted 3 tons of CO2 into the atmosphere, 10 times what an average Kenyan emits in an entire year. Flying first class doubles these numbers. However, the total climate impact of planes is likely two to three times greater than the impact from the CO2 emissions alone. This is because planes emit mono-nitrogen oxides into the upper troposphere, form contrails, and seed cirrus clouds with aerosols from fuel combustion. These three effects enhance warming in the short term. (Note that the charts in this article exclude these effects.) Given the high climate impact, why is it that so many environmentalists still choose to fly so much? I know climate activists who fly a hundred thousand miles per year. I know scientists who fly about as much but “just don’t think about it.” I even have a friend who blogged on the importance of bringing reusable water bottles on flights in order to pre-empt the miniature disposable bottles of water the attendants hand out. Although she saved around 0.04 kilograms of CO2 by refusing the disposable bottle, her flight to Asia emitted more than 4,000 kilograms,

2 equivalent to some 100,000 bottles. I suspect that most people simply don’t know the huge impact of their flying—but I also suspect that many of us are addicted to it. We’ve come to see flying as an inalienable right, a benefit of 21st-century living that we take for granted. The quantitative estimates of my emissions guided me as I set about resolving the dissonance between my principles and my actions. I began to change my daily life. I began to change myself. My first change was to start bicycling. I began by biking the 6 miles to work, which turned out to be much more fun than driving (and about as fast). It felt like flying. Those extra few pounds melted off. Statistically speaking, I can expect biking to add a year to my life through reduced risk of cardiovascular disease. Other moves away from fossil fuels turned out to be satisfying as well. I began growing food, first in the backyard and then in the front, and I discovered that homegrown food tastes far better than anything you can buy. I began composting, an honest and philosophical practice. I tried vegetarianism and found that I prefer it to eating meat; I have more energy, and food somehow tastes better. I began keeping bees and chickens, planting fruit trees, rescuing discarded food, reusing greywater, and helping others in my community do the same. I stopped taking food, water, air, fuel, electricity, clothing, community, and for granted. I became grateful for every moment and more aware of how my thoughts and actions in this moment connect to other moments and to other beings. I began to experience that everyday things are miracles: an avocado, a frame of honeycomb crowded with bees, a conversation with my son. Now, I feel more connected to the world around me, and I see that fossil fuels actually stood in the way of realizing those connections. If you take one idea from this article, let it be this: Life without fossil fuels is fun and satisfying, and this is the best reason YES! Illustration by Jennifer Luxton. to change. But none of these changes had the quantitative impact of quitting flying. By 2013, my annual emissions had fallen well below the global mean. I experienced a lot of social pressure to fly, so it took me three years to quit. I experienced a lot of social pressure to fly, so it took me three years to quit. Not flying for vacations was relatively easy. I live in California, and my wife and I love backpacking. We drive on waste vegetable oil, but even normal cars are better than flying. Four people on a plane produce 10 to 20 times as much CO2 as those same people driving a 25 to 50 mpg car the same distance.

3

My wife and I drive 2,000 veggie oil miles to Illinois each year to visit our parents. Along the way, we sleep under the stars in the Utah wilderness. This is adventure travel, the opposite of fast travel, and it has deepened my relationship with my parents. After such a journey, I more easily see how precious my time with them is. Not flying is an ongoing challenge as I progress in my scientific career, but I’m finding that I can thrive by doing good work and making the most of regional conferences and teleconferencing. Not flying does hold back my career to some extent, but I accept this, and I expect the social climate to change as more scientists stop flying.

YES! Infographic In today’s world, we’re still socially rewarded for burning fossil fuels. We equate frequent flying with success; we rack up our “miles.” This is backward: Burning fossil fuels does real harm to the , to our children, and to countless generations—and it should, therefore, be regarded as socially unacceptable. In the post-carbon future, it’s unlikely that there will be commercial plane travel on today’s scale. Biofuel is currently the only petroleum substitute suitable for commercial flight. In practice, this means waste vegetable oil, but there isn’t enough to go around. In 2010, the world produced 216 million gallons of jet fuel per day but only about half as much vegetable oil, much of which is eaten; leftover oil from fryers is already in high demand. This suggests that even if we were to squander our limited biofuel on planes, only the ultra-rich would be able to afford them.

4

Instead, chances are that we’ll live nearer to our friends and loved ones, and we won’t be expected to travel so far for work. Those both seem like good things to me. With the approaching 8 billion, my reduction obviously can’t solve global warming. But by changing ourselves in more than merely incremental ways, I believe we contribute to opening social and political space for large-scale change. We tell a new story by changing how we live.

Dr. Peter Kalmus wrote this article for Life After Oil, the Spring 2016 issue of YES! Magazine. Peter is an atmospheric scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (speaking on his own behalf) and a contributing editor for YES! Magazine. This article draws on material from a forthcoming book about our interconnected ecological predicament. A working draft is available to read here.

Copied 2/18/2016 from: http://www.yesmagazine.org/issues/life-after-oil/how-far-can-we-get-without-flying-20160211 (Highlights, footnotes and minor edits may have been added by aiREFORM)

5

52 comments Nancy Ellen Abrams • 6 days ago It's pretty ironic that by taking climate science seriously and living accordingly, you are held back in a climate science career. Climate scientists should instead get bonuses for modeling not just carbon emissions but a low-carbon life.

Peter Kalmus Nancy Ellen Abrams • 3 days ago Thanks Nancy. The only bonus I'm interested in is a livable world.

Sam Bliss Nancy Ellen Abrams • 2 days ago So ironic. Damn.

Joe Public Nancy Ellen Abrams • 3 days ago "Climate scientists should instead get bonuses for modelling not just carbon emissions ...." Provided they get to bear the FULL costs of the repercussions of ALL failed predictions. Remember that CSIRO had such confidence of its employees' abilities it added this disclaimer to publications: "This report relates to climate change scenarios based on computer modelling. Models involve simplifications of the real processes that are not fully understood. Accordingly, no responsibility will be accepted by CSIRO or the QLD government for the accuracy of forecasts or predictions inferred from this report or for any person’s interpretations, deductions, conclusions or actions in reliance on this report."

J4zonian • 6 days ago I went through a similar process, although in a different order and starting in 1976. I've been bicycling since then, vegetarian since '79, gave up flying and driving about 10 years ago. I grow about half my food and some for others. I teach about greening lives and climate catastrophe, and the main thing I've learned and teach is that this kind of responsibility-taking and life change is great and we should all do everything we can personally, but in the end none of it will matter if we don't change US politics so that the 95% of people who don't care enough to make all these changes on their own will also live ecological lives and stop destroying the biosphere. Cutting emissions in one sector by a few percent with more efficient versions of planes and cars we have now won't cut it.

6

The latest science says we need to reduce by at least 90% in the next 5-8 years or we face rapidly escalating chances of irreversible and utterly catastrophic changes in both climate and society. We have no carbon budget left, and the only rational response is a global, US WWII-style industrial mobilization to replace all use with efficiency, conservation, wiser lives and clean safe ; of the planet and transforming chemical industrial agriculture to low-meat organic . We need to rebuild the US rail system including a national high speed rail network, and connect it to local and regional transit hubs here and Canadian and Mexican-and-beyond HSR lines. PS. First class costs more carbon because the seats and space between seats are bigger, meaning fewer people on the plane. Fewer seats mean more emissions per person when you split the total plane emissions by the number traveling. PPS. People don't travel on cruise ships to get somewhere, exactly; there are much less carbon- intensive ways to travel by boat. But that is another thing we have to radically change--less oceanic travel and freight, dramatically more efficient and renewable-powered ships (sail, sail- assisted or solar).

Peter Kalmus J4zonian • 6 days ago Have you looked into Citizens' Climate Lobby? They are an awesome group of normal people (volunteers) advocating for a revenue neutral carbon fee and dividend. In my opinion this is the best "first step" policy move any nation could take to fight global warming (for many reasons). I believe that reducing our own emissions is a wonderful and empowering first step, but that we *also* need to advocate for intelligent policies.

J4zonian Peter Kalmus • 5 days ago We need all kinds of different work being done on this, but I'm involved with the Climate Mobilization, www.theclimatemobilization.org getting people to pledge to vote only for candidates who also pledge to push for a rapid industrial mobilization for climate catastrophe avoidance. I'll probably also volunteer for Sanders' campaign.

Penny Walker • 3 days ago Thanks Peter for this optimistic article, and for the leadership you are showing. I stopped flying a few years ago, and have blogged a bit about this decision http://www.penny- walker.co.uk/.... My work involves supporting champions, so I've also developed exercises to help people think about their choices and how they frame those choices. I wrote up one exercise here. http://static1.squarespace.com... There's also this facebook group https://www.facebook.com/group...

7

Parke Wilde • 5 days ago Wonderful article! We have a group of more than 300 academics / researchers / scholars working on exactly this issue: www.flyingless.org . We will tweet this Yes! article from @flyingless . Please support our online petition. We offer resources and FAQ for thinking of this issue as a collective problem (not just about personal choices).

Sam Bliss Parke Wilde • 2 days ago Awesome!!! Signing the petition now. I rode my bicycle from Seattle to Barcelona (with some ship travel) where I am studying now. I was lucky to have so much time last summer but now feel constant pressure to get to conferences, attend a different university next year, to see my family, etc. Only by collectively committing to slow travel can we make it socially achievable to reach our goals without flying often. So I am happy to see this movement.

Judith Fournier • 6 days ago I don't understand why a person flying first class would cause twice as much CO2 emissions as a person flying coach on the same plane. Also, cruise ships are MUCH worse on a daily basis than flying, so any travel across an ocean would need to be by plane as the lesser of two evils.

Peter Kalmus Judith Fournier • 6 days ago An empty plane emits almost as much as a full plane (~80%). To a good approximation, then, your share of the flight's emissions are proportional to the space allocated to you on the plane, and first class seats take up more space. Indeed, first class might emit far more than 2x coach, see e.g. this article (clickable link).

Knight_of_Infinite_Resignation Judith Fournier • 4 days ago travel across oceans is possible by crewing on yachts (zero emissions) or by taking a berth on a container ship which would be making the trip anyway. witsendnj Judith Fournier • 5 days ago Because one seat in first class takes up a lot more space, that would be shared between two people in coach...same as a single passenger car means more emissions per person than car pooling or bus. Perhaps there just shouldn't be travel across an ocean? Do we have a divinely given right to do so? Just a thought.

Josh Kearns • 2 days ago

8

Right on, man! I have also massively curtailed my flying in recent years, traversing the US east- to-west and north-to-south by bike and train for meetings, conferences, even my PhD defense. I also developed a calculator specific to " professionals" working in the developing world. It calculates how long a person needs to live at a local developing community in order to offset the CO2 impact of their flight to and from the field - the "Break Even Ecological Footprint," or BEEF! http://www.resilience.org/stor...

George Marshall • 3 days ago An important discussion- not least because CO2 is only part of the problem...if you factor in contrails and NOX you have a far greater impact still. I am always amazed by the collective silence about the impacts of flying among intelligent and concerned academics and environmental campaigners...just goes to show that smart people do smart denial ! witsendnj • 5 days ago The pie chart isn't accurate without factoring in the emissions caused by the author in reproducing. He should add in half the emissions for each child he has fathered (not just annually but some portion of their future contribution). This matters because, although I agree air travel should be banned along with a lot of other frivolous energy consumption, it is true that a person could do a lot of flying and if they refrain from adding to the human population they would still not emit as much CO2 as a parent (especially as they cannot guarantee their child won't fly later in their life!). Without making any moral judgments about whether or not adding more people to an overcrowded planet is justifiable, it simply goes to show that there is no simple way to persuade people to reduce consumption and population enough to make a significant dent in the trend towards catastrophic climate change (and resource depletion, and pollution). Which is why #WASF.

Peter Kalmus witsendnj • 5 days ago The biosphere desperately needs the human population to stop growing, and I applaud the decision not to have children. I also agree that one person's not having children, or one person's radical reduction in emissions, will not in itself "save the world." However: during our brief visit on this gorgeous planet we may as well be a part of the solution instead of part of the problem. What's more, I believe our personal decisions accumulate into a movement, and then into a cultural shift, and then into large-scale change. Keep trying, keep doing all you can, and never give up! shastatodd • 6 days ago i decided to stop traveling by air in 2011... and the world got much larger.

9

falstaff77 • 3 hours ago "Burning fossil fuels does real harm to the biosphere, to our children, and to countless generations—and it should, therefore, be regarded as socially unacceptable." Making a change first requires honesty. Dogmatic, look at me saving the world essays are not that. Here's a bit more of the story. As with many things, scale is everything. It is the burning of many, many GT of fossil fuel that does harm. If Kalmus and all other Americans stop making good use of fire tomorrow that harm will be largely unchanged. No, with GHGs every little bit avoided does not help. And for many not on, say, the government payroll, the speed of modern travel is not an indulgent luxury preventing some kind of connection with the world. Nor is the space to raise chickens and grow food. Just as true as that burning vast quantities of fossil fuels causes some harm is the truth that in much of the world fossil fuel consumption lifts billions out of grinding poverty and avoids literally millions of premature deaths. This recognition is not required by any and all that would like to lead a less wasteful lifestyle, but for hipsters who want to elevate their personal preference to what is or is not to be "socially acceptable", then yeah, skipping a large part of the story is socially unacceptable.

Bea Dewing • 4 hours ago Not flying does not have to mean more driving. CA also has good train service. You may find an Amtrak trip to Illinois less stressful than driving, and it is certainly producing far less pollution.

Steve Richmond • 2 days ago Great article, good to know the stats. But, if you appreciate marketing and the fact a picture is worth a thousand words, the photo of the model and plane emotionally trumps the logic of the article. Meaning, to a broader audience, this would be an advertisement for flying.

Sara Lee • 3 days ago interesting article. Didnt they notice around 9-11 when all flights were grounded that the temperatires actually got warmer since the planes' emissions created some type of buffer zone...

Peter Kalmus Sara Lee • 3 days ago No, this is incorrect. There was a 2002 study claiming a change to the day/night temperature difference, but there's widespread agreement (i.e. I know of no expert dissenter) that contrails and cirrus cause net warming.

10

Patricia Tallman • 3 days ago Peter, you may be interested in my recent book The Restore-our-Planet Diet: Food Choices, our Environment, and our Health. www.restoreourplanetdiet.com hereiam33 • 3 days ago How does his not flying keep the plane from flying? Its still going to fly whether he's on board or not. Apparently our leaders who preach climate change aren't going to put themselves out by not flying. They fly all the time. The President and his wife have been known to take two planes when one would have done the job.

Sam Bliss hereiam33 • 2 days ago Planes are scheduled based on demand. So choosing not to fly affects future flight patterns. I agree completely with your statement about our leaders, and would extend it to most wealthy people who care about climate change. They are really in a position to make a statement.

Ross Redman • 3 days ago Air travel can be greener. Boeing and Airbus with smaller independents are working on pollution free taxiing. Not great but a start. The next step is assisted takeoff, a scaled up version of an aircraft carrier catapult for commercial aircraft. (A large amount of fuel is expended getting the plane in the air.) This could be clean electric assisted. One better is full electric airplanes. Granted they are only available for small craft today. The one I like is the electric dirigible or rigid airship. (It has the potential to replace helicopters.). in 2014 there were 102,465 flights per day. That is a lot of people and stuff to reduce or reroute. Yes, I know we have to minimize air travel, but I am not sure we can convince all these to stop. reduction is something we could do in the short term.

Anthony • 4 days ago This is great. I don't want to come across as a dick, but it's very convenient for the middle to upper class to be more environmentally friendly. As a person who earns about twenty grand a year, if you're not flying to visit family, you're spending about as much on gas or other means of transport as flying and you're spending time not earning money on travel. I can't afford a prius or a wvo vehicle. I don't hand the money or the means. I know how to travel on a budget, I can get across the country with about a hundred bucks, but risk losing a job if I do. It'd be nice to see information on how to be more environmentally friendly and poor.

11

Sam Bliss Anthony • 2 days ago Tim is correct. One critique I have of the article is that, other than food and obvious energy like electricity and heating fuel, the author does not count "stuff" he purchases, which of course is made by taking materials out of the ground and/or cultivating them, processing, manufacturing, shipping, etc.. all of which burn carbon-based fuels. Including this consumption-based could perhaps make the author's reduction more dramatic, since I get the feeling he is also buying fewer new things as part of his lifestyle change. The point is, people with lower incomes typically have much smaller climate impacts than the wealthy, simply because they buy fewer clothes, gadgets, filet mignons, first-class flights, taxi rides, second homes, etc. Having a hybrid car and solar panels on your three-story house makes you look green, but buying less makes a much bigger difference than buying "eco-sustainable"

Tim Anthony • 3 days ago While flying may be cheaper than the alternatives, many of the changes the author suggests save money - in particular, cycling rather than driving and eating less meat. With regards to the type of vehicle you can afford, the price of hybrids (it doesn't have to be a Prius) is coming down all the time as the technology matures, and you can still choose the most economical vehicle within your price budget. The final thing I want to add is that, as a general rule, being poor tends to be good for the environment. Almost anything you can spend money on will be associated with some carbon emissions, so the less money you spend, the more CO2 you save.

Knight_of_Infinite_Resignation • 4 days ago excellent article. My wife and I gave up flying 12 years ago. Its been great. We still travel to Scandinavia every year for conferences, but now we get to go by train and ferry, see all the places between and meet interesting people. Not flying has definitely altered my perception of distance and the value of travel. It has been tough at times, and there have been trips we couldn't do, but it has been more than worth it and I wouldn't go back to flying. tt_tiara • 4 days ago The Trans-Siberian Express rail system has been largely electrified and that electrical power can come from low-carbon sources. Here is a link to photos of Moscow subway stations... https://www.google.com/search?...

Mary Benefiel Dunn • 4 days ago

12

I am an American living in England, and decided to give up flying a few years ago now. But there is a caveat, to see my family we occasionally fly home, which means to me that all short hops flights to holiday destinations are OUT. The train network in Europe at least is much better joined up than in the USA. And as others have already pointed out, it is possibly to holiday closer to home. And now with Skype and live-streaming events, we can be in a meeting in our own space. westomoon • 5 days ago Two words: "trains" and "buses." witsendnj • 5 days ago One other thing! Burning ANYTHING, not just fossil fuels, is detrimental to the environment. Not just detrimental, but disastrous, because it creates ozone, and ozone is toxic to all living things. It is particularly poisonous to vegetation, which is why trees are in decline all over the world. Just like the loss of coral reefs, the loss of forests will spell entire ecosystem collapse. https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Your1Friend • 6 days ago In regard to "alternative energy sources" for airplanes: is there currently any significant research to the end of replacing fossil fuels?

Marina DPJ • 6 days ago awesome!!

Ken Stokes • 6 days ago U go! Calculating one's footprint, as you found, can be a radicalizing step. Still, our challenge is as much about switching away from fossil fuels as about switching away from flying. Heck, we've already got short range electric planes...

Robert Margolis • 6 days ago

13

Perhaps flying will continue, but using more efficient engines and larger planes. Often we jump to elimination of something rather than look to its transformation.

Peter Kalmus Robert Margolis • 6 days ago Sadly, planes may already be almost as efficient as they can be. See e.g. this article (clickable link). NASA is beginning work on more efficient planes, but they won't be commercial for at least 30 years, if they are even viable, and they may only improve efficiency incrementally. See this article (clickable link). Beware techno-optimism!

Robert Margolis Peter Kalmus • 5 days ago Looked up on IPCC. Next efficiencies will come from air traffic management. Another factor is that most folks do not travel by air all the time. I can see air travel continuing although with new regulations as well as technologies.

Peter Kalmus Robert Margolis • 5 days ago So maybe with hypothetical ultra-efficient planes and flight management 30 years from now, 50k passenger miles would emit 10 tonnes CO2 instead of 14. The point of the article remains. To continue business-as-usual aviation we need carbon-free, not merely greater efficiency; and in 2016 carbon-free planes on the BAU scale are no more than a techno-optimist's dream. falstaff77 Peter Kalmus • 3 hours ago To obtain change, the first step is to show what something like the total elimination of aviation emissions would accomplish by way of climate outcome. In the the case of the US, the answer is nothing measurable. For the entire world, the answer is a little more than nothing. A complete switch off to natural gas in a bridge period, that will have a very measurable difference, while at the same time saving lives and lifestyle from the harm of traditional pollutants and strip mining. Aggressive use of , aggressive use of GMO crops: these already have a proven decarbonization effect.

J4zonian falstaff77 • an hour ago We're already beyond safe levels of both CO2 and temperature. That's obvious from the effects we've already seen. Only if we rapidly eliminate essentially all GHG emissions and sequester as much CO2 already emitted through reforestation and transforming chemical industrial agriculture to low-meat organic permaculture does civilization have any reasonable hope of surviving. That means efficiency, conservation, wiser, more ecological lives, clean safe renewables. Nuclear hasn't

14 competed even with coal in the alleged market, and now wind and increasingly solar are as cheap as coal, cheaper many places and getting even cheaper everywhere. Stopping coal without stopping all fossil fuels will 1. only delay the real solutions and waste time and money, 2. increase the harm fracking does to water supplies everywhere, 3. not reduce GHGs at all, since the given off by leaks at least makes up for the lower CO2, and 4. decrease particulates, increasing heating in the short term, which is the term that matters, especially to the tipping points it will trigger. Organic permaculture means less nitrous oxide, more sequestration, and more resilience in the face of the heating effects to come. The only rational action at this point is an immediate global US-WWII-style industrial mobilization to build the necessary renewable, transit, ag and other infrastructure in the next 5-8 years. We will go over the 1.5°C limit that is the highest possible relatively safe level; we have to stay as low as possible after that and come back down to pre-industrial CO2 and temperature as soon as possible. All of your suggestions will make the situation worse and make our survival less likely. www.theclimatemobilization.org

Robert Margolis Peter Kalmus • 5 days ago I just looked it up: aviation is 11% of CO2 emissions. It would seem that some improvement would take off enough emissions for this sector. Larger fossil fuel reductions in the power and ground transportation sectors should get us close. I am not saying that there will be no changes, however we need to be able to fly in our modern world.

J4zonian Robert Margolis • 5 days ago Not sure what you mean by "enough". It's clear we have to reduce by more than 90% overall in the next 10 years or risk utter catastrophe; that means every sector has to reduce by more than 90% or else some sectors need to reduce more than more than 90% to make up for the slackers. Where could we cut more than 100% (that is, cut completely plus resequester what's already been put in the atmosphere by that sector) in less than 10 years? (Agriculture and reforestation don't count for other sectors' sequestration; they have their own to do so we can drop as quickly as possible back below about 350 ppm CO2e. Ideas? falstaff77 J4zonian • 3 hours ago What about the non hypothetical catastrophe that elimination of fossil fuels in the third world will cause?

J4zonian falstaff77 • an hour ago

15

The third world is already going for renewables in a big way. They're leaping over the pit of despair that is the fossil fuel age and we should help them do it. And, if we expect global civilization to survive this catastrophe we need to help them make that transition while we do. Helping the several billion in the world still in poverty (increasingly so because of the predation of the richest few) will allow them to live happier, more fulfilling lives while we do. Because of the delay conservatives have caused the last few decades, we're going to face horrific trials in the next few, but the elimination of fossil fuels is not any part of that. The catastrophe in the third world will be made worse, as it is now, if we continue to listen to conservatives and ignore the suffering they're causing by delaying rational action. Conservatives have been ignoring the suffering they've caused since there were any conservatives; we appreciate the sudden crocodile tears for the poor, birds, bats, etc. but maybe it's time to stop listening to them and do what's right and effective.

FRANK_MACCIOLI • 7 days ago Curious. Were your flying emission estimates based on emissions/plane trip or emissions/plane/person?

Peter Kalmus FRANK_MACCIOLI • 6 days ago I used the mean of the IPCC and EPA estimates for CO2 per coach passenger mile. See IPCC, Aviation and the Global Atmosphere, 1999; and the EPA's “Calculation Sources” web page.

Sum Dood • 5 days ago I suggest your opinions will be better informed once you've watched Cowspiracy: https://youtu.be/_CJxGSatpbU

16