The following is a guest post by the team at CrowdsourcedExplorer.com . We regularly encourage these practices to reduce your vacations carbon footprint in our own travels and decided this article was the perfect match for Staying Afloat Blog, so read on.
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With all the credible science indicating catastrophic consequences if the world continues on its current path of increasing emissions, more and more people are looking for ways to reduce their carbon footprint. While it’s crucial that you do this in your daily life, don’t slip up when you travel abroad—after all, tourism comprises 8% of global carbon emissions. So, whether you’re going to Rome or Bangkok, don’t forget to implement these 10 simple steps. Some of them will even make your vacation more enjoyable!
1. Fly smart… Or don’t fly at all
Air travel is one of the principal drivers of the climate crisis. The carbon footprint of a single flight is staggering—more than many people emit in a whole year. Thus, it’s essential that you make climate-smart choices when you fly. Use an airline that has a climate sustainability program. Fly economy so you’re using less space per person. Fly direct, so you’re not using multiple airplanes.
Better yet, don’t fly at all. If you can drive to your destination, even in a gasoline car, it’s almost certainly better, although this depends on the precise distance and number of passengers. If it’s a solo holiday, it’s possible a direct economy flight will have a lower footprint than driving, but if there are at least two of you, driving is the more climate-friendly choice. And if other forms of transit such as trains or buses are available, definitely opt for these.
2. Don’t print your tickets
This one is self-explanatory. Trees are a crucial ally in the fight against catastrophic global warming. Every time we use paper, we’re supporting their destruction. The solution: use as little paper as possible. E-tickets and e-bookings are available for almost everything these days, including flights, hotels, and more—so use them.
3. Bring the right luggage, and don’t overdo it
Firstly, keep the overall weight of your luggage down by not packing a bunch of stuff you don’t even need. Regardless of your method of travel, one simple rule is universal: the more weight you carry, the more fuel is needed to transport it. Secondly, take as many reusable items as possible. If you have your own refillable bottles, containers, bags, etc., the amount of plastic you’ll end up using will go down drastically.
4. Choose your hotel carefully
As the climate emergency gathers pace, more and more hotels are taking steps to mitigate their impact, such as reducing energy use, offsetting, and sourcing their products and materials from local and sustainable providers. Those that do are not just acting out of concern for the environment—it’s good publicity. Thus, if a hotel is taking action on carbon sustainability, you can expect to see it on their website, making it easy for you to choose your place of stay proactively.
5. The “do not disturb” sign is your best friend
At home, we only wash our sheets weekly or fortnightly—so why do we need them changed on a daily basis when we stay at a hotel? Or vacuuming—this only needs doing once or twice a week. Towels need a little more cleaning, but probably not every single day. There’s absolutely no reason to change this just because someone is doing it for you, so hang that sign on your door when you don’t genuinely need the service. Of course, this also enables you to avoid being, you know, disturbed—perfect if you want to lie in on your vacation.
6. Don’t waste energy
You wouldn’t do it at home, so don’t do it where you’re staying. Avoid overuse of air conditioning or heating, make sure appliances are unplugged, switch off your cellphone when you’re not using it—nobody likes being bothered on vacation anyway—and if you don’t plan on eating or drinking the overpriced junk in your minibar, don’t leave it plugged in.
7. Enjoy the local food
I mean, why wouldn’t you anyway? Why travel halfway across the world to eat a cheeseburger that isn’t as good as the one you can get two blocks away from your home and drink the same beer you can buy in your local supermarket? Local cuisine is invariably both cheaper and tastier than imported stuff, even before you take into consideration the climate implications of imported ingredients. Expand your mind, expand your palate, and shrink your carbon footprint.
8. Choose sustainable methods of local travel
Mainly: if you can avoid using a gasoline car, then don’t. Take buses and trains, ride a bike, or if you are renting a car, then explore the possibility of an electric one or a hybrid. If you’re staying in a major city full of interesting attractions, then it’s entirely possible that you can have several days where you simply walk. It’s the best way to explore and truly experience a city, after all, besides being good exercise. Do make sure to plan beforehand, though.
9. Don’t feel you have to go everywhere
When staying somewhere, there’s always a temptation to try and explore every single notable site in a 50-mile radius. Don’t bother—if you’ve picked a good destination, it’s probably impossible anyway. Focus on a handful of the places you find most interesting, and spend the rest of your vacation, you know, vacationing—relaxing, enjoying yourself and not worrying about rushing around. This will not just cut down on stress, but also significantly cut your carbon emissions, and help you to reduce your vacations carbon footprint.
10. Offset your vacation
Despite all the measures above, it’s all but impossible to avoid emitting more carbon than normal when you travel. What you can’t save, you should offset. Invest in carbon offset, capture, or storage programs—and make sure that they’re genuine ones that really do take carbon out of the atmosphere.
Now that you’ve planned your eco-friendly vacation, you need somewhere to go! Looking for suggestions? Try CrowdsourcedExplorer.com, where local people from thousands of cities around the world provide advice and travel tips about their hometowns.
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How do you work to reduce your vacations carbon footprint?
These are some great tips to reduce your travel carbon footprint. I do try to implement most of them, but I am guilty of printing tickets for flights and tours. Going forward, I’ll try to rely on paper tickets less and save my digital ones in a safe place so they are easy to find! Thanks for the great tips!
Some of these tips certainly involve some adapting and changing old habits Hannah – I feel that. I’ve got all the confidence in you to start cutting back on print-outs in 2023 😉
I love and use all of those! Well, not all I rarely use “do not disturb” sign since I am rarely in the room 😀 But the rest I do! And I love to walk when in other cities 😀
Great stuff Anja! Putting the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign on the door is actually the first thing I do haha Safe travels!
We’ve been doing more road-tripping and train travel of late… since that is so easy in Europe. I don’t think we’ll ever go back to the level of flying we used to do… but that’s also because we don’t work 9-5 anymore – so we can take out time.
LOVE the train!!! Glad to hear you’ve made a shift in your travel habits to allow you to be more of a ‘slow traveler’, I aspire to get there one of these days!
I agree, we don’t need to print tickets these days. Everything should be on the phone. And it’s easy access as well.
It’s a small and simple way to start changing our habits Fransic! I’m big on the supporting local and getting around on public transportation myself!
I’ve come across these changes you speak of in terms of the hotel. I was pleasantly surprised to see the toiletries in eco-friendly refillable bottles and washing towels less.
So glad to hear it’s becoming more widespread amongst the hotels you’ve stayed at Deirdre! We actively seek out eco-friendly hotels these days <3
I really love this idea. I try to offset my carbon footprint when flying, but these are all fantastic ideas as well.
There are so many more tricks to implement nowadays Samantha! Glad to hear you are making and effort – every little bit helps 🙂
I agree with all of these (I strongly vouch for #9). Have been offsetting my emissions for some years now (have seen the whole journey of parties trying to develop credible programs, the teething problems, the plugging of the loopholes…).
Re: offsetting, it’s not a panacea, but I see it as what you do for the emissions you do decide to spend, until a renewable option arrives. For instance, I offset my home energy emissions for a decade until it became possible to subscribe to renewable power. And those renewables projects have been accelerated, because offsetting changed the financing rules for power projects.
Yessss Teja!! It sounds like you are ahead of the pack with your renewable/sustainable practices!! Thank you for your efforts!!
Some great suggestions here. I didn’t realise I have been travelling eco-friendly for some time. I plan to implement more strategies you suggested on my next trip.
Too often to people overlook some of the simple ways to reduce their footprint Sharyn! Glad to hear you’ve already incorporated some of these practices. Happy travels!
Great tips & such an important topic! I agree that the choice of accommodation is one of the essential aspects of a sustainable holiday, so it’s worth researching properly before choosing a hotel. I always prefer supporting local businesses in order to support the local economy.
Some of these tips are definitely more challenging than others Jill! Glad to hear you are doing your part to help out! Every little bit helps 🙂
Great tips! I often feel guilty about how our frequent travel affects the environment…
I feel that Adriane, but there are many small things we can do to try and reduce our impact. Gotta start somewhere!