Study: The personal carbon footprint of the wealthy is vastly underestimated

By Sarah Collins of CAM,

The personal carbon footprint of the richest people in society is grossly underestimated, both by the rich themselves and by middle and lower income earners, regardless of country. At the same time, both the rich and the poor drastically overestimate the carbon footprint of the poorest people.

An international group of researchers, led by Copenhagen Business School, the University of Basel and the University of Cambridge, surveyed 4,000 people in Denmark, India, Nigeria and the United States about inequality in terms of their personal carbon footprint – the total amount of gases with greenhouse effect produced. through a person’s activities – in their own country.

Although it is well known that there is a large gap between the carbon footprint of the richest and poorest in society, it was not clear whether individuals were aware of this inequality. The four countries chosen for the survey are all different in terms of wealth, lifestyle and culture. Survey participants also differed in terms of personal income, with half of the participants belonging to the top 10% of earners in their country.

The vast majority of participants in the four countries overestimated the average personal carbon footprint of the poorest 50% and underestimated that of the richest 10% and 1%.

However, participants in the top 10% were more likely to support certain climate policies, such as increasing the price of electricity during peak periods, taxing red meat consumption or subsidizing carbon dioxide removal technologies such as carbon capture and storage.

The researchers say this may generally reflect higher levels of education among high-income earners, a greater ability to absorb price-based policies, or a stronger preference for technological solutions to the climate crisis. The results are reported in the journal Nature Climate Change.

Although the concept of a personal carbon or environmental footprint has been used for over 40 years, it became widely popularized in the mid-2000s when the fossil fuel company BP ran a large-scale advertising campaign encouraging people to determine and and reduce your personal carbon footprint.

“There are certainly groups that would like to push the onus to reduce carbon emissions away from corporations and onto individuals, which is problematic,” said co-author Dr. Ramit Debnath, assistant professor and Cambridge Zero Fellow at the University of Cambridge. “However, personal carbon footprints can illustrate deep inequality within and between countries and help people identify how to live greener.”

Previous research has shown widespread misperceptions about how certain consumer behaviors affect a person’s carbon footprint. For example, recycling, turning off the lights when leaving a room, and avoiding plastic packaging are lower impact behaviors that are overestimated in terms of how much they can reduce your carbon footprint. On the other hand, the impact of behaviors such as red meat consumption, home heating and cooling, and air travel tend to be underestimated.

However, there is limited research on whether these misperceptions extend to people’s perceptions of the composition and extent of their personal carbon footprint and their ability to make comparisons between different groups.

The four countries selected for the survey (Denmark, India, Nigeria and the USA) were chosen because of their different per capita carbon emissions and levels of economic inequality. In each country, approximately 1,000 participants were surveyed, half from each group of participants from the top 10% of their country and the other half from the bottom 90%.

Participants were asked to estimate the average personal carbon footprint specific to three income groups (bottom 50%, top 10% and top 1% of income) in their country. Most participants overestimated the average personal carbon footprint for the bottom 50% of income and underestimated the average footprint for the top 10% and 1% of income.

“These countries are very different, but we found that the rich are quite similar, no matter where you go, and their concerns are different from the rest of society,” Debnath said. “There’s a huge contrast between billionaires traveling by private jet while the rest of us drink through wet paper straws: one of these activities has a big impact on an individual’s carbon footprint, and one doesn’t.”

The researchers also looked at whether people’s ideas about carbon footprint inequality were linked to their support for different climate policies. They found that Danish and Nigerian participants who underestimated carbon footprint inequality were generally less supportive of climate policies. They also found that Indian participants in the top 10% were generally more supportive of climate policies, potentially reflecting their higher education and greater resources.

“Poorer people have more immediate concerns, like how they’re going to pay their rent or support their families,” said first author Dr. Kristian Steensen Nielsen of Copenhagen Business School. “But across all income groups, people want real solutions to the climate crisis, whether they are regulatory or technological. However, the people with the largest carbon footprints bear the greatest responsibility for changing their lifestyles and reducing their footprint.”

After learning about actual carbon footprint inequality, most participants thought it was mildly unfair, with those in Denmark and the United States finding it the most unfair. However, people in the top 10% rated inequality as fairer than the general population, except in India. “This could be because they are trying to justify their higher carbon footprint,” Debnath said.

The researchers say more work is needed to determine the best ways to promote fairness and justice in climate action across countries, cultures and communities.

“Due to their greater financial and political influence, most climate policies reflect the interests of the wealthiest in society and rarely involve fundamental changes in their lifestyles or social status,” said Debnath.

“Greater awareness and discussion of the existing inequality in personal carbon footprints can help increase political pressure to address these inequalities and develop climate solutions that work for everyone,” Nielsen said.

The study also involved researchers from Justus-Liebig-University Giessen, Murdoch University and Oxford University. The research was supported in part by the Carlsberg Foundation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Quadrature Climate Foundation and the Swiss National Science Foundation.

By Sarah Collin by CAM, via Zerohedge.com

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