Paris: It is estimated that climate change summit in Paris which aims to tackle global warming will itself emit 3,00,000 tonnes of CO2. The top world leaders and businessman, and activists have travelled from across the world for the summit.
Mostly the leaders arrived in planes and some by train or cars.The average round trip per attendee is exppected around 9,000 miles, according to the calculation by Wired and Steven Stoft of climateParis.org.
Taking the fuel consumption of a Boeing 747 — around 16.5 miles per gallon — which the website describes as a ‘happy medium between private jets and bullet trains’, around 27 million gallons of fuel will be used by travellers attending the conference.
According to the rough calculations, each gallon of fuel produces around 21 pounds of carbon dioxide. The total CO2 released by planes flying to and from Paris is thought to be about 575 million pounds (2,90,000 tons).
But given that some planes will very likely carry more than one attendee, this figure is likely to be at the very highest end.
In an opening speech at the summit, Prince Charles warned world leaders that ‘we are becoming the architects of our own destruction’ as he called for immediate action to halt global warming. The Prince of Wales urged them to ‘think of your grandchildren, as I think of mine’ as well as the billions of people without a voice and the youngest generation as they try to secure a new global deal.
Over the next fortnight negotiators from 195 countries will attempt to hammer out a deal that will put the world on a path to prevent temperatures rising by more than 2C above pre-industrial levels.
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