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From Here to There, Which is Greener?

October 16, 2011 by 7 Comments
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The longtime Gas 2 friends, contributors, and all-around awesome people over at One Block Off the Grid (1BOG) have just released a shiny new infographic comparing the carbon footprints of planes, trains, and automobiles as they make trips across town, and across the country. Despite missing some obvious “ringers” (I’m pretty sure a 150+ cc scooter or small-displacement motorcycle would have walked away with top honors here) the graph has a ton of great information … and some surprising results for trains and planes in some circumstances.

Were you surprised by the numbers? Do you think they skewed too heavily against cagers cars? Let us know what you thought, in the all-new Gas 2 comments section!

Source: 1BOG.

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About Jo Borras

I've been working in motorsports and tuning since 1997, with some the biggest names in the business. In 2008, the work we did on a hybrid/EV concept car attracted the attention of Gas 2 editors, and they invited me to join the team. I couldn't resist!

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  • Curly

    It seems a little out of line the 5200 pounds of CO2 for a 2500 mile trip in a large sub at 12mi/gal. That trip would take less than 1600 pounds of gasoline at 8 lb/gal which gasoline is less that that. At 7lb/gal that would 1400 lb of gasoline. If gasoline was pure carbon which it is not and there was 100% conversion to CO2 that would only = 5300 lb CO2. The numbers don’t add up!

    • T Adkins

      @curly
      I saw your post and I am also intrigued as to how they arrived at their numbers. I watched a documentary once and they stated that for every gallon of gas you burn you put out @19 pounds of CO2. Me and a roommate went over the numbers for the 19 pound thing and the figures seemed fairly accurate, but even if we just call it 20 pounds per gallon for easier math I only get 4167pound of CO2 for distance they have with just the straight driving and burning of gas and no other inputs.
      btw gasoline is @6lb/gal
      -T

    • http://gas2.org Jo Borras

      I would guess the “inflated” figures jive with your math, but they’re also including some sort of estimated idle time … or else including oil burned, tire wear, etc. in their math. We should ask them!

  • http://Web John

    I’d love to know the occupancy rates they used for these computations. The numbers would be quite different for a train/bus/plane only half occupied vs. fully occupied. Some routes are typically full most of the time, whereas others are rarely full.

    Also, the advice to not use upgrades to 1st or business class on a plane seems wrong to me. Economy typically fills up before 1st or business, so upgrading will in many cases free up a seat for someone else, therefore making that flight slightly more efficient.

    I also wonder if they put subways and electic trains (light rail?) in the same category. I’m having trouble believing that a bus in NYC is more efficient than the subway. Especially at rush hour when the buses are stuck in bumper to bumper traffic.

  • http://Web Jem Thomas

    Am I missing something; seems a bit unfair that the electric car has no smoke when the electric train does. Implies that the Electric car is emission free which is not the case.
    Perhaps it meant to say “charged off the grid” using Solar, in which case the car would be nearly zero (taking into account the carbon cost of the production of the PV cells and installation and maintenance)
    Still a good visual to get the message across.

  • George

    Looking at the electric car, sounds great, until you consider charging time:
    Normal charging – 8 hours Japan 200 V
    – 7 hours US 240 V
    Quick charge – 30 miles for 10 min charge,
    – 30 min to 80% charge, 90 miles?

    At $32,780, that is not practical for a car that I can only drive around town. Even if you could find charging stations every 90 miles or so, averaging 60 mph while actually driving, you would only average 45 mph between charges. 350 mile trip would take a little over 7 hours 45 minutes, 2500 miles, just over 55 1/2 hours.

    I think I’ll stick with my hybrid for a while longer