Climate Inaction: Why Your Carbon Footprint Matters
“Just 100 companies are responsible for 70% of carbon emissions.” It's true, according to a Carbon Majors report by the Climate Accountability Institute: Between 1988 and 2017, 71% of historical emissions were released by just one hundred companies, and over half can be traced to just 25 corporate and state owned entities.
This fact is just one piece of a tapestry that has been woven by members of the left wing of the environmental movement. Many left wing environmentalists argue that individual campaigns to go green in your daily life aren’t just futile to fighting such an intractable problem, but in fact result in a net harm to the climate. They argue that this line of thinking places blame and responsibility on individuals for decarbonizing our society, rather than institutions, corporations, and economic models, distracting from the macroeconomic, systemic changes required to actually solve the problem. Telling people that they are the problem, that the planet would be saved if only they recycled one more water bottle or ate one less burger helps the real culprits—those 100 corporations—to avoid the responsibility they hold for knowingly and hedonistically leading our planet towards destruction.
The argument that individual action is harmful to the climate movement has been peddled by articles in The Guardian that decry eco-consumerism as doing nothing but relieving your guilt, or in the Outline, which published an article in 2018 titled “The Only Individual Action that Matters is Voting For People Who Care about Climate Change.” A columnist in the Daily Beast penned “Why Your Carbon Footprint is Meaningless,” and USA Today and Vox have published pieces to the same effect. Even progressive politicians such as Senator Elizabeth Warren have said that talking about light bulbs and cheeseburgers are exactly what the fossil fuel industry hopes the general public is talking about.
It makes sense why the belief that it is harmful to promote individual actions as a solution to climate change is so popular. For one, its premise is based in truth: individual action is not enough to stop climate change. There are simply not enough do-gooders to make a significant dent in the amount of methane released by producing red meat, nor enough people with the capital to switch to solar panels to decarbonize our electric grid. When British Petroleum launches a campaign to encourage people to calculate and reduce their own personal carbon footprint, it raises concerns of the aforementioned fear that focusing on personal sustainability detracts from larger campaigns to change policy to end fossil fuel subsidies, impose carbon taxes, or create standards and regulations that accelerate the decarbonization of industries. Put another way, it is true that systemic change is crucial to tackling the climate crisis.
But the other reason why the belief that individual action is detrimental to the climate movement is so popular is because it’s easy to believe. Choosing to eat less meat is hard. Choosing to buy an electric car or solar panels is hard. Choosing to take a train instead of fly, to spend your weekend picking up trash instead of swimming at the beach is hard. It costs money and time that could be otherwise spent on other priorities, and that requires sacrifice. It’s much easier to believe that it’s okay to eat that hamburger, to take that extra flight, because nothing you can do will ever make any difference, and so there’s no real point. It’s easier to believe that focusing on your individual action is harmful because it doesn’t require you or me to sacrifice the comforts we take for granted. All it takes is to point a finger at the 100 corporations who are responsible for 70% of carbon emissions and say “this is your fault.”
But the real fault lies in thinking that individual change and systemic action are mutually exclusive. Research has shown that this belief simply isn’t true. It turns out that people who engage in personal conservation and sustainability efforts are both more likely to convince others around them to engage in sustainable behavior and to support policy changes to bring about the systemic decarbonization of our global economy and society. For instance, one study found that the odds of a person buying solar panels for their home goes up for every nearby household that has already installed them, and that that probability is higher when those panels are visible from the street. Moreover, community organizers who own solar panels themselves convince 63% more people to install panels on their homes than those who do not. In a study done at a cafe, customers who were told that 30% of Americans had recently changed their behavior to eat less meat were twice as likely to order a meatless lunch than those who were not. And a survey found that 50% of people who know only one person who gave up flying for the environment flew less themselves.
The logic behind why sustainable behavior spreads throughout communities is obvious, and it centers around the fact that individuals put a premium on acting normal. People are more likely to take action on climate change if doing so is perceived as the standard. It’s not enough to just tell people that climate change is an existential problem, they have to see that it is normal to treat the climate as an existential problem. And models that predict how the world can achieve net zero emissions through Shared Socioeconomic Pathways, or SSPs, find that many storylines require substantial behavior change “oriented towards low material growth and lower resource and energy intensity,” meaning that while of course individual action is not sufficient to stave off climate change, it is still necessary.
Individual Action also forms a key part of how systemically impactful legislation is passed. Politicians are encouraged to support and prioritize climate legislation when they see that their constituents are passionate about environmental concerns, and that their electoral chances depend on their support of environmental laws. Even among those who personally support environmental action, politicians are unlikely to champion environmental reform if they do not detect the necessary enthusiasm from their constituents. What better way to signify that enthusiasm than by taking the personal sacrifices necessary to reduce your own carbon footprint, influencing those around you to do the same?
Individuals practicing personally sustainable behavior not only correlates with but actually causes them to be more supportive of sustainable policy on an institutional level. A paper published in the journal of Energy Research and Social Science conducted two large studies to explore and explain this phenomenon. Respondents in the experimental group were asked in succession to identify their past environmentally conscious activities, reflect on how those actions connect to their identity and values, and whether they support a carbon tax, a prominent climate policy proposal. Respondents in the control group were asked only whether they supported the policy. The study found that 57% of respondents in the experimental group supported a climate tax, whereas only 49.8% of the control group did. By connecting individually sustainable actions to their sense of self, people see being environmentally conscious as part of their identity, and are more likely to support policy proposals that are in line with those beliefs due to a desire to be ideologically consistent.
These findings, and others like it, suggest environmentalists should start viewing personal responsibility and large systemic transformation not as opposites, but rather complements to each other in the fight against climate change, and that there is no reason to avoid campaigns to reduce our carbon footprint. An increase in public support from 49.8 to 57 percent of a carbon tax could very well be the difference between a bill dying on the floor of a legislature and being signed into law. It turns out that conventional wisdom is wrong, and that individuals cannot absolve themselves of their personal duty to this fragile planet we call home.
So we need to show the world that this is important to us. 70% of carbon emissions are released by 100 corporations, but it is also true that 80% of fossil fuel emissions in the US can be traced back to consumer demands. Knowing your choices have broad reaching consequences is scary, it means that we’re all going to have to make sacrifices to create a better world for future generations. But it's also empowering. It means that your choices matter, and that choosing to live your life in a more ethical, moral way is important to making the world a more ethical, sustainable place.
Max Edelstein is a Staff Writer and freshman (SEAS’25) studying Environmental Engineering and Political Science. He has been a climate activist since high school and is interested in using scientific literacy to fight for the planet.
Article idea credit to Hank Green.