{"id":15,"date":"2007-02-20T16:45:22","date_gmt":"2007-02-20T21:45:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/climate411\/2007\/02\/20\/picturing-a-ton-of-co2\/"},"modified":"2008-04-22T12:52:17","modified_gmt":"2008-04-22T17:52:17","slug":"picturing-a-ton-of-co2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/climate411\/2007\/02\/20\/picturing-a-ton-of-co2\/","title":{"rendered":"Picturing a ton of CO2"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tons of CO2<\/sub> pollution. We are always hearing about how many tons of CO2<\/sub> pollution we emit. The average American car emits about seven tons of CO2<\/sub> in a year; the average American family, about 24 tons; the United States as a whole, over seven billion tons; and worldwide, almost 30 billion tons. The Virgin Earth Challenge (see last week’s post<\/a>) offers $25 million to whoever can economically remove one billion tons of CO2<\/sub> from the atmosphere each year.<\/p>\n

But what is a ton of CO2<\/sub>?<\/p>\n

People keep saying to me, I thought CO2<\/sub> is a gas. How can a gas have weight?<\/em> I explain that CO2<\/sub> is made up of atoms, and atoms have mass, and with gravity mass has weight. As often as not, my explanation is met with a blank stare. So let me try a different tack.<\/p>\n

Picture a football field, and then imagine a round balloon with one end lined up on the goal line and the other on the 10 yards line \u2013 that is, a balloon with a diameter of 10 yards. If that balloon were filled with CO2<\/sub>, it would weigh about 1 ton; it would be a 1-ton CO2<\/sub> balloon.<\/p>\n

In 2006 an American family emitted the equivalent of 24 CO2<\/sub> balloons by powering their home, driving their cars and flying. If you lined those balloons from end-to-end they would go from goal line to goal line almost two-and-a-half times \u2013 240 yards!<\/p>\n

Within a year or two, a little more than half of those CO2<\/sub> balloons will be absorbed from the atmosphere into the ocean or trees. Unfortunately, the rest of the balloons will hang around for a very long time. One hundred years from now there will still be almost half a football field of CO2<\/sub> balloons left to overheat the earth. And that’s just the CO2<\/sub> from one family in 2006. There will also be CO2<\/sub> balloons from 2007, 2008, and so on.<\/p>\n

In total, Americans were responsible for more than seven billion CO2<\/sub> balloons in 2006. Lined up end to end they would circle the earth 1,600 times, and the number grows each year. Isn’t it about time we start taking the CO2<\/sub> out of some of those balloons?<\/p>\n

Do you have ways of your own to imagine what a ton of CO2<\/sub> looks like? If so, post them here! If I think of other ways to visualize a ton of CO2<\/sub>, I’ll add them, too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tons of CO2 pollution. We are always hearing about how many tons of CO2 pollution we emit. The average American car emits about seven tons of CO2 in a year; the average American family, about 24 tons; the United States as a whole, over seven billion tons; and worldwide, almost 30 billion tons. The Virgin …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[95],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-15","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-basic-science-of-global-warming"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nPicturing a ton of CO2 - Climate 411<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.edf.org\/climate411\/2007\/02\/20\/picturing-a-ton-of-co2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Picturing a ton of CO2 - Climate 411\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Tons of CO2 pollution. 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