A return flight from London to Melbourne produces 16.8 tonnes of carbon emissions per passenger. The average human carbon emissions is 4 tonnes per year. The average US citizen produces 16 tonnes per year.
EDIT: SMH’s figures are bogus.
3 Likes
I believe that Dane worked (still does?) in the fossil fuel industry, so he’s a bit of an apologist.
Suppose it depends where you look.
Can either be classed as accurate?
Where I work is irrelevant.
Not in your case. It clouds your perspective, and your posting history on this topic amply demonstrates such.
Either that, or you’re just wrong.
1 Like
That sounds a bit off. If you take a 747, which is pretty energy inefficient, it will go 14,000km on 240,000 litres of kerosene. London to Melbourne is around 17,000km so it would need around 290k litres. Round thst up to 300k to account for multiple take offs.
If you get 3kg co2 from 1l kerosene that’s about 900tonnes per flight. A 747 can carry about 560 passengers. It should be 1.6 tonnes.
2 Likes
I’ve just googled this and there are loads of different answers coming up for a Heathrow to Melbourne return flight. It shows that it’s an inexact science (not sure why, though) but the average appears to be somewhere in the region of 5-6 tonnes per person for a return journey.
2 Likes
Rule number one: don’t t trust the SMH.
Should be about 7 tonnes for the round trip from London to Melbourne. I imagine this calculation is not just the fuel cost but the full emissions cost of the trip.
Which is about the same as Dane’s figures, and about 175% of the average human’s emissions.
I hope you’ve run that by the pedant for confirmation of accurate figures?
2 Likes
The efficiency of aircraft can vary wildly. It also depends on the assumed occupancy rates. I think this is why it was suggested that any environmental tax should be per flight rather than per passenger.
2 Likes
Back of a fag packet calculation. It’s just that it looked like they were an order of magnitude out.
1 Like
But, but you know where I work, I must be wrong?
One clearly doesn’t need to have passed comprehension at school to obtain a job in the fossil fuel industry.
Believe it or not, regardless of my academic qualifications or where I work, I’m totally on board with doing all I can to contribute to helping the environment.
I’d not be surprised if my yearly carbon footprint is actually smaller than yours.
My ego certainly is
You’re almost certainly wrong… on both counts.
1 Like
Then we’ll agree to disagree
1 Like
Fucking love international breaks. Everyone is on edge without the football on.
6 Likes
There are some more accurate figures here:
It really does depend on the utilisation.
E.g the 747-400 is rated as 12.31kg/km fuel burn, and 3.16l/100km per seat.
A 787-8 with half the seating capacity is 5.38kg/km and 2.77l/km.
Per seat, there isn’t that much difference, but if the number of empty seats goes up, the older plane rapidly goes up per passenger.
1 Like
The fundamental point is that air travel is bad for the environment and we should be doing as little of it as possible.
1 Like
Agreed.
More so with domestic or short haul flights where alternatives methods of travel are feasible.
Problem there is, pricing of alternatives will stop people from using them.
Often the pricing of the alternatives is dictated by the government.
So the vicious circle continues
2 Likes