Technocrat

Famous Green Spokesman Blushing Red

zogger
Tue May 13 15:45:58 -0700 2008
Environment

This is funny in an ironic sort of way. Paul McCartney is a "go green" advocate and a Lexus campaigner, and so in appreciation, they sent him a new top of the line hybrid. But they sent it by jet, negating any "green-ness" to it. They estimate flying the car to the UK caused as much carbon emissions as driving around the world six times.

.."But instead of arriving by boat as expected, the car was flown to Britain on a Korean Air flight, creating a carbon footprint almost 100 times bigger than if it had come by sea."

ed.z.: Well, he could always donate it to someone greener if he wants to assuage his conscious and like ride his skateboard around for penance... "Dear Paul.." ;)

 
Famous Green Spokesman Blushing Red
Uncle Entity
Tue May 13 18:11:15 -0700 2008

A hybrid limo of all things?

How about a flotilla of computer assisted wind powered cargo ships to ply the seven seas with a virtually nil carbon footprint. Just need some VC investors...

  
Famous Green Spokesman Blushing Red
Butterwaffle Biff
Tue May 13 20:16:51 -0700 2008
I think he should refuse to accept it and see if they fly it back to Japan.
  
Famous Green Spokesman Blushing Red
ColaMan
Tue May 13 20:30:12 -0700 2008

Carbon offsetting firm CO2balance.com said the plane journey would have caused a carbon footprint of 38,050kg, compared to 397kg for a three-week boat journey.

How do they work out these numbers? Anyone know for sure?

38 tons seems to be awfully high..... and 397kg for a 3 week boat journey seems to be awfully low in comparison.  I presume that the boat is carrying 20,000 tons of other freight and the boat's emissions are divided down to get the car's footprint.

Even a direct fuel burn of 38 tons to get one jet from Korea to the UK seems to be a bit much...unless it's a big jet, carrying a load of other stuff. So, the question is, did they charter the jet exclusively for the delivery of said limo, or was there some other freight going along for the ride?

A 2000kg limo in with 40 tons of other freight on the flight would make it only 1/20th of that footprint  - or about 1900kg - but it doesn't sound so (gasp) dramatic.

 

  
Famous Green Spokesman Blushing Red
duhavid
Tue May 13 21:10:39 -0700 2008

I suspect, if the number is correct, it is because you are combining n tons of fuel with m tons of air breathed in by the engines, resulting in the combined mass of CO2 produced.

  
Famous Green Spokesman Blushing Red
mcrbids
Tue May 13 21:28:13 -0700 2008

Even a direct fuel burn of 38 tons to get one jet from Korea to the UK seems to be a bit much...unless it's a big jet, carrying a load of other stuff. So, the question is, did they charter the jet exclusively for the delivery of said limo, or was there some other freight going along for the ride?

It's hard to understand just how much fuel a jet actually burns. According to this website, the average fuel burn of a 747 flying Mach 0.80 is about 24,000 lbs of fuel per hour. Since that's about 600 miles per hour, and a rough guess for distance is about 10 times that, confirmed by the listing of a flight taking 10:40 flight time, I think this is a pretty solid figure.

So 240,000 lbs of fuel works out to 120 tons of fuel. Does 38 tons sound unrealistic? Sounds like a mid-sized jet (EG: 767) flown around the world, carrying pretty much just 1 hybrid car.

 
Famous Green Spokesman Blushing Red
ColaMan
Tue May 13 23:30:58 -0700 2008

Sounds like a mid-sized jet (EG: 767) flown around the world, carrying pretty much just 1 hybrid car.

Well, that's just it - no shipping company worth its salt sends a jet out with just one piece of cargo, unless that cargo takes up every last scrap of available carrying capacity.

But anyway, a little more poking around the internet produced a snippet from Virgin's eco-fuel test recently said that" CO2 emissions are normally about three times the fuel burned", so perhaps they're right.

Still, I wouldn't mind seeing the numbers  before I go into a paroxysm of eco-foaming-at-the-mouth. :-p

  
 

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