Americans' Carbon Footprints Twice as Big as Others

A class at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT, studied the carbon emissions of Americans in a wide variety of lifestyles - from the homeless to multimillionaires, from Buddhist monks to soccer moms - and compared them to those of other nations.

They found that in the United States, even people with the lowest energy usage account for, on average, more than double the global per-capita carbon emission. Those emissions rise steeply from that minimum as people's income increases.

"Regardless of income, there is a certain floor below which the individual carbon footprint of a person in the U.S. will not drop," says Timothy Gutowski, professor of mechanical engineering, who taught the class that calculated the rates of carbon emissions.

The results will be presented in May at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers International Symposium on Electronics and the Environment in San Francisco.

While it may seem surprising that even people whose lifestyles are not extravagant, such as the homeless, monks, or children, are responsible for greenhouse gas emissions, one major factor is the array of government services that are available to everyone in the United States.

These basic services, including police, roads, libraries, the court system and the military, were allocated equally to everyone in the country in this study.

Other services that are more specific, such as education or Medicare, were allocated only to those who actually make use of them.

The students conducted detailed interviews or made detailed estimates of the energy usage of 18 lifestyles, spanning the gamut from a vegetarian college student and a five-year-old up to the ultrarich - Oprah Winfrey and Bill Gates.

The energy impact for the rich was estimated from published sources, while all the others were based on direct interviews. The average annual carbon dioxide emissions per person, they found, was 20 metric tons, compared to a world average of four tons.

Homeless people generate greenhouse gas emissions as do those with homes. (Photo credit unknown)

But the "floor" below which nobody in the U.S. can reach, no matter a person's energy choices, turned out to be 8.5 tons, the class found. That was the emissions calculated for a homeless person who ate in soup kitchens and slept in homeless shelters.

The analysis was carried out by Gutowski and 21 students in his 2007 class, "Environmentally benign design and manufacturing."

They derived a system for making such comparisons, which they call environmental life style analysis, or ELSA.

Unlike some other attempts to quantify carbon-emission rates, Gutowski and his students took great care to account for factors that are often overlooked such as the "rebound effect."

That is when someone makes a environmentally benign choice - such as buying a hybrid car instead of a gas-guzzler - but then uses the money saved from their reduced gasoline costs to do something else, such as taking a long trip by airplane. The net impact, in such a case, may actually be an overall increase in carbon emissions.

"When you save energy, you save money," Gutowski explains. "The question is, how are you going to spend that money?"

The students looked at the factors within each person's control that might lead to a reduction in carbon output. They found that achieving significant reductions for the most part required drastic changes that would likely be unacceptable to most people.

In a continuation of the class this semester, another group of students are exploring this question in more detail, looking at just what kinds of things people really can do to limit their environmental impact.

The question they are addressing, Gutowski says, is "can average Americans tighten their belts" in a way that would make a significant difference?

In general, spending money on travel or on goods that have substantial energy costs in their manufacture and delivery adds to a person's carbon footprint, while expenditures on locally based labor intensive services - such as going to a therapist, taking an art class, or getting a massage - leads to a smaller footprint.

But the biggest factors in most people's lives are housing, transportation and food.

"The simple way you get people's carbon use down is to tax it," Gutowski says. "That's a hard pill to swallow - politicians don't like to step up" to support such measures."

Absent such national actions, he says, it is important to study "what role consumer choices can play" in lowering the nation's carbon emissions.

If nothing else, the members of his class got a new perspective. "The students really got into it," Gutowski says. "It raised everybody's awareness about the issues."

Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2008. All rights reserved.