You and your significant other. Partners in crime. Like minded climate couples. This climate+ package assumes a couple with 2 cars, living in an average sized home, eating a well-rounded diet, with 4 hours of daily phone use each.
What Does climate+ Mean?
How Can We Do Better?
- •Turning your thermostat down by two degrees.
- •Wearing clothes more than once before washing them.
- •Biking, walking, or riding the bus to work!
- •Switching over to LED bulbs and smart appliances.
- •Trying to buy local, seasonal fruits and vegetables.
- •Using waxed cloth instead of plastic wrap for food.
- •Remembering your reusable bags, mugs, and cutlery for outings.
The Impact Of Trees
Why Trees
What Does ‘Sequestering’ Mean to tentree?
Where Do We Plant Your Trees?
The Math
The Math
This climate+ package assumes a couple with 2 cars, living in an average sized home, eating a well-rounded diet, going on vacations, watching Netflix and 5 hours of daily phone use each.
| Cars | 0.63 MT CO2 |
| Flights | 0.27 MT CO2 |
| Hotels | 0.08 MT CO2 |
| Phones | 1.17 MT CO2 |
| Netflix | 0.29 MT CO2 |
| Food | 0.55 MT CO2 |
| Energy for housing | 0.63 MT CO2 |
| Total | 3.62 MT CO2 |
Cars
The average car uses about 404 grams of CO2 per mile. To translate from miles to kilometres, we divide miles by 1.609, and simultaneously divide grams by 1.609. This means the average car uses about 251 grams of C02 per kilometer.
(divide by 1.609) 1: 404grams (divide by 1.609)
0.6214: 251grams
The average Canadian drives 15,200km per year, so we can multiply the amount of kilometres by the emission factor 251grams CO2 per kilometer. This gives us a total of 3,815,200 grams of C02 per year.
251 grams of C02 / kilometer x 15,200 km = 3,815,200 grams of C02 per year
In order to change grams to metric tons, we multiply grams by 0.0000001 which gives us 3.185 metric tons of C02 per year.
3,815,200 grams C02 per year x 0.000001 = 3.815 metric tons of C02 per year
If this couple has two cars this would be a total of 7.63 MT CO2 per year
3.815 MT x 2 people = 7.63 MT CO2 per year or 0.63 MT CO2 per month.
Flights
Planes emit 115g CO2 per kilometer. We use the conversion factor 0.000001 to get from grams to metric tons and we get 0.000115 MT of CO2 per kilometer of air travel.
115grams x 0.000001 = 0.000115 MT Carbon
Let’s assume that over the year this couple flies from Vancouver to Toronto twice per year, which is 6,710km round trip and 13,420 for two trips. They also fly to Europe once per year, this year they go to Denmark which is 7,680km one way, and 15,360km both ways. In total, this couple is flying 28,780km per year.
In order to get the total emissions, we multiply 0.000115 by 28,780 km and get 3.3097MT CO2.
0.000115 MT x 28,780= 3.3097 MT CO2 per year or 0.27 MT CO2 per month.
Hotels
Hotels emit about 31kg of CO2 per room per night. Assuming this couple stays at hotels 30 nights per year during their vacations, and each night emits 31kg CO2, they will emit a total of 930kg of CO2 from hotels.
30 x 31kg = 930kg CO2
In order to change this number from kilograms of CO2 to metric tons of CO2 we use the conversion factor 0.001.
930kg CO2 x 0.001= 0.93 MT CO2 or 0.08 MT CO2 per month.
Phones
If a person uses their phone for one hour per day over a year they would emit 1.4 tonnes of CO2.
The average person spends 3-5 hours per day on their phone. Which means over a year a couple would emit 14 tons of CO2 for phone usage.
1.4 tons CO2 x 5 hours x 2 people= 14 MT of CO2 per year or 1.17 MT CO2 per month.
Netflix
Every half hour of Netflix watched emits 1.6kg of CO2. Since the average person watches 1.5 hours of Netflix per day, we multiply emissions per hour, by hours per day to get total emissions per day.
1.5 hours per day is equal to 3,30 minute segments.
1.6kg CO2/ half hour x 3 half hours = 4.8kg CO2 per day
To find the annual total we multiply emissions per day by 365 days in the year, this calculation gives us 1,752 kg CO2 over one year.
4.8kg of CO2 x 365 days = 1,752 kg CO2
In order to change kilograms into metric tons, we use the conversion factor of 0.001 tons for every kilogram. When we multiply 1,752 g by the conversion factor, we get 1.752 MT of CO2 emissions per year.
1,752kg CO2 x 0.001 = 1.752 MT CO2 per year
For two people, this would emit 3.504 MT CO2 per year.
1.752MT CO2 x 2 = 3.504 MT CO2 or 0.29 MT CO2 per month.
Food
A person with a diet including a lot of meat, dairy, fruits and vegetables and cereals emits 3.3 MT CO2 per year. For two people this would emit 6.6MT CO2.
3.3 MT CO2 x 2 people = 6.6 MT CO2 per year or 0.55 MT CO2 per month.
Energy for housing
The average household emits 7.5 MT of CO2 per year or 0.63 MT CO2 per month including laundry, showers, heating and cooling and appliances.
Total
In total a couple would emit 43.4737 MT CO2 in one year or 3.62 MT CO2 per month.
0.63 MT + 0.27 MT + 0.08 MT + 1.17 MT + 0.29 MT + 0.55 MT + 6.3 MT = 3.62 MT CO2
Link - Car Emissions - https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/greenhouse-gas-emissions-typical-passenger-vehicle
Link - Phone Emissions - https://nypost.com/2019/05/01/a-year-of-cell-phone-use-emits-as-much-CO2-as-two-round-trip-flights/
Link - Average Phone Use - https://www.inc.com/melanie-curtin/are-you-on-your-phone-too-much-average-person-spends-this-many-hours-on-it-every-day.html
Link - Food Emissions - https://www.greeneatz.com/foods-carbon-footprint.html
Link - Household Emissions - https://www.ccfpd.org/Portals/0/Assets/PDF/Facts_Chart.pdf
Link - Flight Emissions - https://www.carbonindependent.org/22.html
Link - Flight Length Vancouver to Toronto - https://www.airmilescalculator.com/distance/yyz-to-yvr/
Link - Flight Length Vancouver to Europe - https://www.prokerala.com/travel/flight-time/from-copenhagen/to-vancouver/
Link - Carbon Emisssions of Netflix - https://www.livemint.com/companies/news/half-hour-of-netflix-leads-to-emissions-of-1-6kg-of-co2-equivalent-climate-experts-11572240109579.html
Link - Average Time on Netflix - https://time.com/4186137/netflix-hours-per-day/