How much is 1 ton of CO₂?
Sweden’s total greenhouse gas emissions were around 85 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalents (CO₂e) in 2019. How much is that, one might wonder? Is one ton of CO₂e a lot or not? Here are some comparisons to make it easier to understand:
8.65 tonnes / personAn average Swedish person emitted 9.1 tonnes of CO₂ equivalents in 2019.
6.5 tonnes / personAn average world citizen emitted a total of 6.5 tonnes of CO₂ equivalents during 2019.
Only 0.33 °C leftThe 2018–2022 global mean temperature (based on data up to May or June 2022) is estimated to be 1.17 ± 0.13 °C above the 1850–1900 average.
According to the Paris Agreement (2015), the 1.5 °C goal could be achieved if everyone on earth emits a maximum of 0.7–1.5 tonnes of CO₂ equivalents per person and year.
So, in order to live a sustainable life, 1 ton of CO₂e is about how much every person on earth should emit per year. In that case we could reach the 1.5 °C goal and avoid some catastrophic events, including wildfires, hurricanes, drought, flooding, etc.
This is of course a hard goal to reach for an individual, since 1 ton of CO₂e equals e.g. a return flight from Stockholm to Lisbon, or a single flight to Toronto for one person. Many things need to correlate to achieve this, e.g. a “polluter pays” policy making more sustainable transport cheaper, and binding CO₂ from the atmosphere.
But a good start is to measure your footprint, because “without a scale you cannot lose weight”.
How big is your footprint?
