this post was submitted on 22 Aug 2026
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[–] Soggy@lemmy.world 2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

https://afdc.energy.gov/data/10311

https://css.umich.edu/publications/factsheets/sustainability-indicators/carbon-footprint-factsheet

I suspect "domestic flights" in the UK are pretty different than the US (a brief search indicates the average flight is around 4 times longer in the US, and planes are far more efficient during the middle of their flight compared to the ends, but average passengers per flight is a little harder to find for both countries to properly figure that out)

[–] gewindestift@feddit.org 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Thank you for the reply. "Your" numbers are not in fuel/mile/person but in energy/mile/person. So an electric train is much better carbon emission wise than it suggests. I was aware that flights and ICE cars are equal-ish per distance, but the takeaway from this should be to not fly or ICE-drive long distances and not that flying is ok.

Flying is really bad and billionaires as well as common people alike should not be allowed to do it. I do not understand why we still have to discuss this.

[–] Soggy@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

The first one is measuring BTUs and converting but the UMich information is straight carbon emissions per passenger mile and planes are only ~30% worse than commuter rail in the US by that metric. It's really not the apocalypse you're making it out to be.