A spreadsheet to calculate your carbon footprint based on heating, electricity, car, plane and public transport use
CRAGs Carbon Footprinting Spreadsheet |
footprinting
written on 22/2/2007 09:16
Bill Phelps |
I understood it was from Mayer Hillman’s book http://www.amazon.co.uk/How-We-Can-Save-Planet/dp/0141016922.
I’ve lent my copy to somebody, so can’t check Hillman’s sources.
However, I see he’s got a lot more detail on things like public transport. A blanket rate for “buses, trains etc” seems a bit crude.
For our local group, a friend of mine has been adapting this one with various refinements. eg:to allow the user to enter meter readings and dates. Is this likely to be of interest to others or will it just confuse things?
Bill
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Bill Phelps :: Stop Climate Chaos (Leeds)
Spreadsheet problems, info needs
written on 3/4/2007 16:37
Bytesmiths |
 |
The entry for “ferries” is not calculated properly. Am I the first to routinely use ferries? I live on an island, and so have unusual data collection needs!
Also, the ferry factor (0.75) seems a bit high to me. I don’t recall why I have this impression, but I thought that a fully loaded ferry used about the same energy as the vehicles on it would have used. And there’s no way to indicate the difference between taking a vehicle on the ferry, or traveling as a passenger.
Also, segregating the vehicles by rather broad ranges in engine size seems a bit arbitrary. Within those ranges, there is probably as much as a 3:1 ratio between the most and least economical vehicles!
It seems it would be fairly simple to input your fuel economy rating (liters/100km or miles/gallon) and distance to come up with fairly accurate carbon emissions.
I note that there is not concensus what to do about biofuels. I drive my least economical vehicle (15 mpg or 16 l/100km) on waste vegetable oil. It seems that should be near-zero-rated, no? All the other vehicles I use are using homebrew biodiesel made from waste oil, which should also be near-zero-rated, although not as good as direct waste oil.
Finally, all my electricity comes from commercial hydro power. While this is much better than coal, should it really be zero-rated, since there’s a massive carbon load in the concrete to be amortized over the lifetime of the dams?
:::: Jan Steinman, a fossil-fuel-free (almost!) zone! http://www.VeggieVanGogh.com ::::
Couldnt agree more on the
written on 3/4/2007 20:37
robinsmith3 |
Couldnt agree more on the hydro power ratings. Actually the H2O tarrif is worse than national average due to it being pumped hydro though they still claim its 100% carbon free. What a sham
All in all the numbers we use are meant to guide your footprints. Exactness is not a primary focus, awareness, attitude and behaviour change is. Thats to say it would be great if you could find a way we could all share more exact footprint factors.
R
Source for conversion factors ...
david
Can anyone give the source for the conversion factors in this spreadsheet? It is not included in the file.