Big Fat Ugly Footprint

No, that’s not Jesus’ footprint. It’s mine. Or maybe Christopher’s. I honestly can’t remember whose it is, but it doesn’t matter because it’s just a metaphor anyway. This post isn’t about feet – it’s about the relatively enormous environmental impact of our trip.

Lots of people are talking about gas prices these days, and as you can see on our “At the Pump” page, the price of gas has been floating around at a record-high $3 million a gallon over the last month. It’s been hard on our wallets, but we’ve been saving up and we expected this trip to be a big drain on our bank accounts, so each time we spend 50 bucks filling up the tank I may wince a little, but the pain passes and off we go. The high price of gas may deter many Americans from driving as much as usual – and for Christopher and me it’s been more of a challenge to put the pedal to the metal.

But if the stops at the pump aren’t phasing us for economic reasons, they certainly do give us that gut-wrenching feeling that we’re participating in the irreversible destruction of our home planet. After poking around on the internet, I just learned that burning a single gallon of gasoline releases about 20 pounds of carbon into the air. Since leaving Massachusetts last month, we’ve driven about 6,600 miles and burned about 250 gallons of gas. That means that the carbon footprint for this trip (just counting travel) is already at 5,000 lbs (or 2.5 tons) of carbon dioxide (CO2). For reference: the average American generates about 2.3 tons of CO2 a year, and it would take an acre of forest a whole year to absorb all the carbon that we’ve produced this month.

Christopher and I like to think of ourselves as eco-minded people with a lesser overall impact on the environment than the “Average American”. Well, the Average American uses about 464 gallons of gas in a year - in another three months each of us will have easily surpassed that amount. Does this mean we have to abandon our self-righteous air? Are we part of the problem? Are the Iraq war, record oil profits, Global Climate Change, and the plight of the Polar Bear our fault?

When we began this journey and bought our car, I remember being a little bit upset that we were getting less than 30 miles to the gallon (Precision Auto has been averaging about 26 miles/gallon). We actually looked at a Honda and a Toyota that both would have gotten much better gas mileage, and they were well within our price range. But the Volvo had a sunroof. It was sporty-looking (for a ‘95), with a standard transmission and seat warmers. It had a CD player AND a tape deck. Basically, luxury won out over ecology. It kicked its ass, in fact.

It might take a while, but eventually we’re going to pay for the enormous footprint of this trip. We might make up for it by commuting on bikes when we settle down somewhere (Christopher will probably end up carrying some of my weight for this one), or we might eventually plant an acre of trees. Maybe we’ll just be sent to hell when the tidal waves come and drown us all. I’m sure we’ll make up for it somehow.