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Interesting fact, jet powered short haul flights are worse per distance due to the fact that most energy is used in takeoff and landing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_aviati...

I also read somewhere that propeller based airplanes flying lower in the atmosphere would be better option for short haul flights.


I find this difficult to believe! One transatlantic round trip flight is about 60% as bad as living car free? Assuming you do not travel at all - right? But you will travel. You will cycle to work, and you will burn more calories, and you will therefore eat more food, ending up contributing just as much too increasing emissions!


"just as much"

This part of your statement desperately requires citation and supporting logic.

Among other things to consider - Compare moving a ~80kg person and a ~13kg bike at 18kph

vs

moving an 80 kg person in one-300th (ish) of a ~300,000 kg plane (call it 1000 kg of plane per person) at 960 kph. 777 GTOW is ~335,000 kg

Now considering that drag is roughly proportional to the cube of velocity, and compare 18kph on a bike to 960 kph on a plane. We'll call it ~50 times faster to keep the math simple. Drag is now 50^3 greater for the plane, or 125,000 times greater.

So you're moving about ten times as much weight and need to overcome 125,000 times as much air resistance while doing it. I think it's fair to say that you can got a lot more miles per burrito on bike than plane.

(https://www.quora.com/Why-is-air-resistance-roughly-proporti...)

This is a shame, because I love traveling to faraway places. But it comes at enormous cost. A low-frills slow cruise ship (think cargo ship with beds, not the Queen Mary 2) might manage all right, but even that's not fantastic. Better electrified rail to replace overland flights would be a good starting point


You get to discount the drag of the plane since at cruising altitude you only have 1/3rd of the pressure.

edit: But then again emissions at that altitude have a larger warming effect..


This got me thinking: do the environmental cost calculations for food waste include calories consumed in excess of daily requirements?

What about alcohol consumption?

Is confectionary, eg. chocolate, lollies, ice cream, considers food waste for environmental purpose, given they are highly processed and completely uncessary from a nutritional perspective?


It's true! Rule of thumb (which may surprise people) is that cars, boats and planes are all about the same for grams CO2 / passenger mile.

So if you commute 10 miles to work every day, they are similar.


I wonder what the difference between 'switch electric car to car free' and 'live carfree' is?

The effect over time or not using rentals/other people's cars maybe?


Manufacturing and maintaining a vehicle produced pollution itself, so not creating demand for one is less polluting than still creating a demand for a vehicle of any type.




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