The goals and the guilt – hit this target and you can stop feeling climate guilt

Now on to what you, as an individual, can do!

I’m going to give you some actual numbers about technologies and I’m going to outline an “average home” baseline energy usage based on normal things like having two TVs, each on for 5 hours a day, using a coffeemaker and hair dryer every morning, having a great fridge and freezer, etc. I looked up each type of device and how many minutes it is usually used per day, then used that to estimate its energy cost per day. https://sciencing.com/convert-watts-kilowatt-hours-2703.html If you’re a couch potato, you can still be a couch potato. This is not about deprivation!

First, transportation types and effects on carbon:

Standard car = 0.78 lbs C02 per mile at best (good option only with 3 or more passengers).

Hybrid car = 0.52 lbs C02 per mile (good option only with 2 or more passengers).

Electric car from solar – 34 kwh per 100 miles = 5.396 lbs carbon per 100 miles, or 0.53 lbs C02 per mile (good option only with 2 or more passengers).

Commuter train, per passenger – 0.35 lb C02 per mile.

Bus, per passenger, mostly full bus = about 0.25 lb C02 per mile (let’s say in a bus holding 42 max, we only want about 34 passengers). USUALLY BEST OPTION.

Plane, per passenger = about 0.53 lbs C02 per mile.

Cruise, per passenger = about 1 lb C02 per mile.

We don’t want to make anyone get rid of their car – but we DO want to create a virtuous cycle where more people start using buses for commuting, then buses start running more frequently, then more people use them, then buses become even better and more comfortable, then more people use them… In a later article I’m even going to show how to save time overall, as well as money, compared to driving. You may be very surprised how few actual mph your car is giving you!

Overall goal is to have 80% of normal daily transportation take place on buses and trains.

Baseline electrical usage per house, as calculated using average electrical usage per device and average or guesstimated time used per day for each:

Multiple house lights, CFL 200 wh

2 smartphones 11 wh a day to recharge

1 laptop or desktop 200 w, 60 min/day at 200 wh

1 tablet 50 wh

2 TVs (200 w each) 5 hours a day each at 2000 wh

1 game console 50 w 2 hours a day at 100 wh

Coffee maker 1500 w, or 500 wh

Microwave 1500 w, or 50 wh

Mixer 125 w or 25 wh

Garbage disposal 500 w or 50 wh

Slow cooker 200 w, or if used twice a week for eight hours, average 500 wh

Curling iron 90 w, 45 wh

Shaver 25 w, 5 wh

Hair dryer 1500 w, 250 wh

Wifi 24 w x 24 580 wh

Dryer 2000 w 1000 wh

Washing machine 500 w 300 wh

Vacuum 200 w, or 50 wh

Chest fridge 100 wh https://mtbest.net/chest_fridge.html

Chest freezer 1000 wh

Well insulated water heater 2500 w for 2 hours so 5000 wh

Baseline: 12016 watt hours or 12 kwh per day.

This does not include the carbon impact of buying new electronics (new laptop = about 200 lbs C02 manufacturing, then about 30 watts an hour for use. New cell phone = about 40 lbs C02 manufacturing, then about 11 to 19 watts a day to recharge).

Using conservative estimates of solar power, the carbon footprint during its lifetime, including manufacture, is about 43 gm of carbon per kwh of eletricity produced. In other words, if you have solar panels installed on your roof producing that 12 kwh you need every day, it’ll produce a little over 1 lb, 2 oz (18 0z) of carbon every day.

Central heat/air tends to run about 5 kw per hour and vary a LOT by region.

This may seem confusing! I’m going to give you four case studies of things individual households can do in very different climates to live very conveniently and take frequent vacations while only giving off 3000 lbs of carbon per year versus the current American average 36,080 lbs! Probably the only two changes you’ll really notice are switching to a different type of refrigerator https://mtbest.net/chest_fridge.html and taking public transport as it gets easier and more appealing.

As I said above, we technically can each give off 4800 lbs of carbon for year and still stop the carbon “bleeding” we have right now, but don’t forget the impact of conventional farming and commerce that we have right now. I chose 3000 lbs as an ideal to work towards, and the assumption will be that once food is localized enough and is grown in a regenerative fashion, food, your clothes, gadgets, furniture, etc., will only be responsible for about 1000 lbs of your carbon budget per year. Then you have 2000 lbs left to play with. I chose this benchmark as a goal for us to aim to achieve in the next 10 years and as a way for us to know we’ve done “enough.”

A lot of us feel constant vague guilt over our contributions to the environment. If and when you reach the 3000 lbs carbon emissions per person per year, stop feeling guilty!

The initial case studies will be US-based, as that is where I am from, and also as many other countries are doing better than we are and we can learn from them. Let’s see which of the rich countries can achieve 3000 lbs per capita first!

We should keep in mind, always, that individual humans can only do so much “fighting” before giving up and burning out. We have to work with human nature to accomplish big goals. Willpower is a finite thing, so we are using it very, very sparingly. The Friday #AdultStrike4Climate is a good use of willpower, as it doesn’t take much willpower but it does have a big impact in telling political leaders we are serious about this. If half of the population stops buying anything on Fridays (which will inevitably lead to overall decrease in purchases also), businesses and stock markets are going to freak out.

Once we know what we want and get enough political power, then we can basically turn the switch and the runaway train will be on a different track, one that does not end in a fiery crash. It all starts with knowing what is possible.