How Bad Is Taking a Cab to the Airport, Compared to the Flight Itself?
by Matthew McDermott, New York, NY 
on 12.15.08
photo: Doc Searls
Pulling back the curtain a bit on the TreeHugger virtual office, I’ll let you in on part of the working method of those of us cranking out the eco-news, pointing our collective Duchampian finger at the latest in green cool, and sifting through all the press announcements to bring you what’s worth paying attention to: We keep a running Skype chat going to share tips and brainstorm ideas. I suppose not a great secret, but that’s where this post comes from.
One day, while contemplating the travel that this job sometimes requires, this question arose: What percentage of the carbon emissions of a trip by airplane is the travel to the airport if you take a cab? While TreeHugger is certainly a big fan of pubic transit, biking and getting out of the car in general, sometimes you’ve got to travel with a heavy load of gear and taking a cab seems the easiest thing to do. In that case, should the concerned greenie overly worry about the carbon emissions of that cab ride?
So, I did some quick back of the napkin calculations:
If I take a cab from my apartment in lower Manhattan to JFK airport, a journey of about five miles, what are the carbon emissions?
NYC Cabs Have Awful Fuel Economy
The average cab in New York City (despite the efforts to green the NYC cab fleet) really gets horrendous gas mileage. Most cabs are the something like Lincoln Town Cars, achieving an astounding 18 miles per gallon. So, based on the EPA standard figure for the carbon content of gasoline (2,421g carbon/gallon = 19.4 pounds CO2/gallon) the trip to JFK emits 5.432 pounds of CO2.
But Your Flight Spews Carbon Like There’s No Tomorrow
What about the flight? For the sake of comparison I checked the carbon emissions of flights of various lengths: Washington DC, Chicago, Los Angeles, Dubai, Singapore. These yielded (for a one-way flight) 120lbs, 300lbs, 1220lbs, 3620 lbs, and 5420lbs of CO2 emissions respectively. You can probably see where this is heading.
Don’t Sweat the Cab, But Buy an Offset for the Flight
It doesn’t take a math genius to see that the cab ride really isn’t a big deal in comparison to the flight as a whole. In this example, only on the flights to Washington DC and Chicago does the cab ride even top one percent of the flight’s carbon emissions (4.53%, 1.81%). For everything else the carbon emissions are essentially negligible: 0.45%, 0.15% and 0.10%.
The Verdict: It’s the Flight Stupid!
Unless you're taking a flight of very short length, if you’ve got to take a cab to the airport because you’ve got an excess of luggage (moving? photographers? filmmakers?) don’t worry about the carbon emissions of the cab ride. Ultimately, the fact that you’re flying at all is the bigger issue that how you get to the airport.
The question to ponder really is whether there isn't a better form of mass transit (train or bus) to get to your destination than flying.
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But what about driving from Detroit to Washington for a big meeting in a Motown version of a hybrid vs a commercial flight?
It's not like 3 people would fly their private jets to the same place, but driving all they way has to be bad.
Out of curiosity, what would the emissions be if you took the train to Washington, DC compared to a plane flight? I'd be very curious to see a comparsion of costs, travel time and CO2 emissions for a short flight versus the train trip.
Cabs pollute like crazy in New York, even if it's marginal compared the the flights ...
However, with 240M yellow cab passengers each year, and up to 35% of the 115M yearly NYC airport passengers using cabs to get there, it's still a huge environmental cost ...
That's why I created CabEasy.com, to allow people to share cab rides. It's a small step forward, but no step is too small ;))
The Union of Concerned Scientists just did a report that looks at the global warming impact of travel based on distance traveled, method of travel, and number of people traveling. http://ucsusa.org/clean_vehicles/solutions/cleaner_cars_pickups_and_suvs/greentravel/getting-there-greener.html
Okay, so a plane fills itself with 150 passengers, who all ride a cab to the airport. Total emmission is 750 pounds-over half the amount burned on a flight to Los Angeles. It doesn't sound so inconsequential to me.
I am glad you are taking the pubic transportation - not me...
Here's what I don't understand. By your own calculations and data, your cab ride to JFK from Manhattan spewed out 1.0864 pounds of CO2 per mile, per person transported. However, a flight from JFK to Singapore (a distance of 9525 miles) on a 747 with about 400 passengers on board would produce .0014 pounds of CO2 per mile/passenger. So your cab ride produced over 776 times more CO2 per mile/passenger than the flight to Singapore and your telling me that the problem isn't the cab ride?! The cab ride is the problem. If you want to do the most good for the environment from a transportation standpoint the most gains can be had by creating efficiencies in local transit systems.
Oh, and in response to taking trains instead of flying. Have you ever considered the massive environmental footprint that laying new rail road takes up? A rail line from New York to Los Angeles (assuming a 50 yard wide easement) would take up 44416 acres. This is over five times the size of JFK and LAX combined. Not to mention the increased chance of death associated with rail travel (675% increase.)
This is a classic case of environmentalist "not being able to see the forest for the trees."
You should probably take into consideration the fact that the cab ride is only you while the plane ride can be a few hundred. If everyone on that plane had to take a cab to the airport like you did I'm sure that the problem would not be with the plane. It's the cab!!!
I don't know if it's the same in New York as in LA, but in LA taxis drive around empty or sit idling most of the time - while the driver waits for a call.
The trip to the airport might only be 5 miles, but taking a taxi still supports the waste that is generated all day long - just something else to consider.
I think some may have missed the point of this article. The idea is that knocking off 1% of your carbon emissions for a trip is hardly measurable progress. Progress sounds more like cutting the amount of trips you take in half. This way you save 50% emissions. Then if you want to do better, then compare the environment impact of Train vs. Plane, and come to an educated decision about which is better. Do this quietly, too, by not insulting those whose opinions you find inferior to yours.