Compare Carbon Footprints of Bay Area Neighborhoods

Clicking on the interactive map is interesting. One thing leaps out immediately: Low population density correlates to higher energy usage. I can understand why for a couple of reasons:

- Apartment/condominiums should be more energy efficient for heating and cooling than single family homes.

- A lower density likely means driving farther to work, hence greater auto transportation footprint and less likelihood to use public transportation.

The breakdown charts confirm this: San Francisco neighborhoods of single-family homes in the Marina show housing at 15.36, transportation at 20.34

While neighborhoods of apartments South of Mission show housing at 2.39 and transportation at 2.89

Those two factors alone illustrate a 7x consumption by single-family structures (plus their cars) over apartments.

I suspect there is also a strong correlation with household wealth, implying larger homes to heat/cool and more automobiles. So it would be interesting to see that illustrated as well.