What is low-carbon travel?

In 2019 the UK government produced a report on the carbon footprint of different means of travel for the previous year and this has been nicely presented in a series of graphs by Our World in Data and an associating article by Hannah Richie here

Carbon footprint of travel by transport type

Based on a high-level view of the data gathered, there is a sliding scale from bad to good. In summary, cars and planes are bad, buses are better and trains and ferries, at least for foot passengers, are the best.

Cars

When it comes to cars, size and fuel matters. Electric cars depend on how the fuel was produced.

Flights

Short haul flights are proportionately more of a problem than long haul.

Public transport comparison

But when we look into the lower carbon means of travel, we can see that trains are better than buses but coaches are better still.

The lowest emissions are from Eurostar, but this is in part down to how the energy is generated rather than high-speed trains being the greenest.

We are individuals

The data gathered for the report is sound. However, it's a survey of what has happened and an aggregation of all the individual experiences.

We are all individuals performing specific journeys which may not be average. Each of us might have had very different footprints from the average person over that year.

Someone who owns a big diesel car, might have had a lower footprint than average by choosing to drive more fuel efficiently and with lots of passengers.

Conversely, I was once the only passenger on a diesel train which seems to spend its days pointlessly chugging up and down a line in Hungary.

Conclusions

This can make it all a bit baffling if you are trying to count the carbon like a personal budget.

By trying to do the right thing and being open to advice and crucially letting others know that you want to travel by low-carbon means, you give policy planners a chance to work out how to move more of us around more efficiently - think of it a mass movement.

The one big take away for me is, if you are going to travel, bloody well enjoy it.