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Comment by tombert | Hacker News Reader

Well, considering that I get my power from a combination of Nuclear and wind power, I doubt that I give a particularly high carbon footprint.

But you're not wrong, I almost certainly have a higher footprint than most of the third world.

I guess what I was getting at is that I think the levels New York has are substantially more sustainable than the rest of the US. Sorry for the confusion.

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I would guess your footprint is more increased by getting all kinds of stuff (you don't really need). And the stuff being shipped across half the globe.

That's a fair point and I'll admit I hadn't considered that.

Conceivably, we could make electric (or something) transportation systems that can travel across the world and not produce and CO2, but we certainly haven't gotten there yet.

Marine transport is incredibly efficient. Total marine transport accounts for ~2% of global CO2 emission. It would be nice to have, but definitely a low priority.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_shippi...

Do you have any data to back up your claim that New York is "substantially more sustainable than the rest of the US"? I'd be genuinely curious to look at that data

It's not terribly hard to find data on NYC's carbon footprint per capita: http://www.eia.gov/environment/emissions/state/analysis/

From the article: "New York, with a population of 19.6 million people, had the lowest per capita CO2 emissions – 8 mt per capita. A large portion of the population is located in the New York City metropolitan area where mass transit is readily available and most residences are multi-family units that provide efficiencies of scale in terms of energy for heating and cooling."

Don't forget to include the chemical energy you use to run your body in your figure for "my power." The impact from agriculture is pretty substantial.

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