carbon offsetting for lifestyles

Carbon neutral

For individuals, carbon neutralising your whole lifestyle can be a wonderfully uplifting experience, liberating you from so-called ‘consumer guilt’ and enabling you to enjoy your life more freely, in the knowledge that your impact on the environment has been drastically reduced.

Eliminating your carbon footprint is remarkably easy to do and, for most people, turns out to be surprisingly low cost, typically coming in around 0.4% of your income.

Your personal carbon footprint is derived from your consumption of food, transport, housing, utilities, products, entertainment and services. It is therefore very much dependent upon your lifestyle choices.

The average carbon footprint in developed countries is around 14,000 kgCO2e (kilograms of greenhouse gases) per person per year, but ranges across a remarkable 5000 kgCO2e and 150,000 kgCO2e per year, depending on levels of wealth and consumption habits.

The cost to offset the average lifestyle and go carbon neutral is around USD 600 (range USD 240-6500) in the first year and USD 210 (range USD 85-2275) in subsequent years.

There are organisations which purport to offer the same service for less. Please refer to our page on tree planting for more information on this, paying special attention to the section entitled tricks and cons.

Below we describe three ways in which you can quantify your personal carbon footprint.

Once you‘ve quantified your emissions, you can choose to go neutral by getting us to plant the appropriate number of super-efficient tropical trees.

Simple calculation

The quickest and easiest way to calculate your carbon footprint is to estimate your total spend during a year and multiply it by an average emissions factor.

It’s a rather crude and approximate method, but one which should be enable you get within 35%.

From there we can calculate how many tropical trees we need to plant to offset your footprint and how much that would cost.

Annual Spend x Emissions Factor = Emissions = Trees = Year 1 cost / Year 2+ cost

USD 25,000 x 0.275 = 6875 kgCO2e = 75 trees = USD 300 / USD 90

USD 50,000 x 0.275 = 12,500 kgCO2e = 136 trees = USD 544 / USD 180

USD 75,000 x 0.275 = 20,625 kgCO2e = 225 trees = USD 900 / USD 297

USD 100,000 x 0.275 = 27,500 kgCO2e = 299 trees = USD 1196 / USD 395

USD 250,000 x 0.275 = 68,750 kgCO2e = 748 trees = USD 2992 / USD 987

USD 500,000 x 0.275 = 137,500 kgCO2e = 1495 trees = USD 5980 / USD 1973

GBP 18,400 x 0.275 = 6875 kgCO2e = 75 trees = GBP 220 / GBP 66

GBP 16,800 x 0.275 = 12,500 kgCO2e = 136 trees = GBP 440 / GBP 132

GBP 25,200 x 0.275 = 20,625 kgCO2e = 225 trees = GBP 660 / GBP 198

GBP 33,600 x 0.275 = 27,500 kgCO2e = 299 trees = GBP 880 / GBP 264

GBP 184,000 x 0.275 = 68,750 kgCO2e = 748 trees = GBP 2200 / GBP 660

GBP 368,000 x 0.275 = 137,500 kgCO2e = 1495 trees = GBP 4400 / GBP 1320

Note that the annual spend should include all taxes, banking charges, mortgages etc. The only elements that can legitimately be removed are (a) wages paid to staff (b) cash gifts and donations (c) money saved but not invested.

If you are happy to run with this kind of broad brush calculation, then all you need to do is take a note of the number of trees and click on this link to purchase your offsets …

Medium calculation

If you would like to calculate your carbon footprint to within around 20% accuracy, then you can grab and pen and paper and follow these instructions.

Instructions

1. Start with your total annual spend in USD.

2. Allocate your USD spend to the categories below, putting any remainder in ‘unallocated’.

3. Multiply each spend by the emissions factor for each category to get the emissions for each in kilograms of carbon dioxide equivalent (kgCO2e)..

4. Add up all of the emissions from the different categories to get your total emissions.

5. Divide this by 92 to get the number of trees needed to offset your emissions and reach carbon neutral status.

6. Multiply by 4 to get the cost in USD for the first year.

7. Multiply that amount by 0.3 to get the cost in USD for subsequent years.

Emissions categories

If you are satisfied that you’ve come up with a number that reflects your carbon footprint with a reasonable degree of accuracy, then all you need to do is take a note of the number of trees and click on this link to purchase your offsets.

Bespoke calculation

If you would like a more detailed analysis of your carbon footprint, then we do offer a comprehensive bespoke service, usually providing around 10% accuracy.

Unfortunately this service is only available to people who’s immediate family has a combined annual expenditure in excess of USD 150,000 or GBP 100,000.

The service starts with an introductory chat between you and one of our environmental experts, after which we should be able to undertake the necessary emissions calculations, leading to a detailed written presentation and a quotation for offsetting.

We usually offer this service free of charge and with no obligation, although we do ask that you only start the process if you are genuinely considering going carbon neutral in this way, as it does involve quite a lot of work!

Next article

Travel

On this page you can calculate the carbon footprint of specific flights or trips that you take and purchase carbon credits to turn these elements of your life carbon neutral.