This is what your travel costs the planet

Hazel Quek
Nov 2 · 3 min read

1 in 7 people in the world traveled across borders in 2018, which is only set to grow at a rate of 3–4% annually with better connectivity, cheaper flights from budget airlines, and the increasing middle income population.

The whole travel & tourism industry accounts for 8% of total global carbon emissions, but what does that look like for you as an individual traveler?

Bulk of your trip’s emission will come from your mode of travel (flygskam!), and the next highest source will come from your accommodation.

While I haven’t found any single site to calculate all the emissions from a vacation, here’s a compilation of a few sources.

Transport mode: Flight via Carbon Footprint’s calculator

They also offer calculation for motorbike, car, bus and rail

Accommodation: Hotel via Hotel Footprinting Tool

Developed by the International Tourism Partnership, this tool aggregates and analyses emission data reported by member companies. You can search by location and view the average emission amount for the type of hotel you are staying with.

Member companies contributing information to this site includes most of the world’s large hotel chains.

Accommodation: Airbnb/rented apartment

If you are doing home-sharing and staying at someone’s apartment, this is the slightly trickier one with 3 steps.

Firstly, the World Energy Council’s map will provide you with the average monthly home electrical consumption information.

Second step is to divide this energy consumption amount by the number of days you are staying.

Lastly, is to convert energy consumption amount for the duration of your stay into carbon emission via MyClimate’s household calculator. This website bases its carbon emission on the different types of methods the country is generating energy from. Hence, your longer stay in a country using more clean energy sources could emit lesser than a short stay in a heavily fossil-fuel dependent country

If you have any other recommendations on calculation tools or information source, I’d love to hear from you!

Thanks to Lucas Neo

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