Do you all feel guilty about flying/ubering so much in the midst of the climate change crisis? I think we should...How do you balance personal ethics about this with work needs?

OP, I don’t feel bad but I’m also a fact-based person, so obviously that means giving a damn about the biggest threat facing humanity

Planes pollute, but it’s not THE factor that’s creating climate change. If we got rid of planes, we wouldn’t see a change we need. I believe much larger changes can come simply from our diet. If we all ate 1/2 the beef we did now, THAT would show an impact. Government not turning the other cheek for short term gain. That would make a difference. I have to focus my energy on what matters most.

People failing to acknowledge individual responsibility, or blaming other countries who per capita omit less than what they do (or only omit to make products for their countries), or give criticism but no solutions. All that matters.

Ignorance, which I’ve leaned through this app is still very present in consultants, is a threat.

Lastly, it’s more than climate change. It’s also biodiversity, ground pollution, unsafe water diversion, habitat distraction, etc. It’s environmental protection. Climate change is the biggest but not the only thing to consider.

As many others already echoed, go vegetarian or even fully vegan to recoup your ethical credits. It’s so easy seriously, you’re already eating out - just order the veg dish instead. If I survived in in the midwest this way you can do it anywhere! You don’t even have to think about it. Was so easy for me to first go vegetarian in my first years of consulting, now I’m fully vegan which is what really makes the difference (if you’re still eating dairy and eggs, from an environment perspective you’re feeding the same industry as meat so just vegetarian alone isn’t really all that much better. Same goes to health benefits when you look at most cohort or meta analyses on vegetarian vs vegan, but vegetarian is certainly a good first step)

Nope. Don’t much care due to reasons explained here. Get China and India in line and then come talk to me.

If we had ethics, we wouldn’t be consultants

Yes. I bike and use public transport in my home city and public trans at client sites when feasible. Flying I feel bad for, contemplating no personal air travel next year.

Lol these answers are pretty f’ed up. OP asks a reasonable question about climate change, and otherwise intelligible people begin a convo about Leonardo DiCaprio’s flying habits. Of course we should all feel a little guilty about barreling through the sky in tubes that spit CO2 and NOx directly into the troposphere just to get to our day jobs.

I still take the subway when I can even if I can expense an Uber... sometimes it’s faster too!
It’s not much but it’s a start.

You quit and become an eco activist.

Any solution to climate change has literally nothing to do with a relatively small number of rich-world consultants stopping taking 2 flights a week.

Wow the number of people using other people’s actions as excuses to do nothing is disappointing
Personally I only eat meat when eating out, don’t do take out, only drink from a travel mug for water/coffee (even at Starbucks), don’t drink the hotel water bottles, bring my own grocery bag, and walk/bike/subway when possible.

Maybe the personal impact is small but I’ve seen that my habits sometimes influence others

Yea, I do. I take the train for all domestic travel (I’m living in Germany - not the US 😏) and take the train when the schedule allows.
Everybody should do all they can, but feeling guilty won’t solve anything. Try to contribute as a private person within your range. Corporations can only be tamed by numbers and that will be done by politics soon.

How many of you saying you feel bad about flying for work "because environment" flew (or drove) somewhere far away for vacation this year? Do you really care about the environment, or are you just looking for a socially acceptable excuse to not travel so much for work?

I would feel guilty about flying if I was crazy rich like Drake and had my own 767. But then again, I would be rich so who cares. In commercial airlines, plane is going to go anyway, why not fill it up?
Lyft is one less car on the road, therefore less congestion, therefore less pollution. Or should we rent a suburban from Hertz and compete for space with the soccer moms?

I'm currently on a project that would require cross country travel, and so I try to work remote as much as I can.

Never understood the arguments about India and China -- I think the issue is that our choices have bigger impact than the average person over there, and we have higher per capita emissions.

For example, my carbon emissions for a single cross country flight is equal to the *annual* per capita emissions in Pakistion, which I think is quite ridiculous.

I became a vegan. I could leave my shower in for a year and still be more environmentally friendly than all of you meat eaters 😜

Of course. I decline all travel unless necessary.

From this thread, it’s amazing how many people will avoid any sense of self reflection and personal improvement and immediately pin it on other factors??

Not one bit

No, I don’t feel guilty and never will. Then again I do t believe in global warming

OP - the whole time. I find it insanely hypocritical when we publish articles on how to tackle climate change and all our consultants are (often unnecessarily) pumping emissions out on flights each week. It’s one of the reasons I will quit soon.

Have you read ‘how bad are bananas?’ - a book that helps to quantify carbon emissions from your day to day life, so you can try and live to a goal of 10 tonnes of carbon emissions a year (btw the US is second worst in the world on this, just below Australia). Flights are just so disproportionately bad, it makes any other efforts a rounding error (eg bringing reusable coffee mugs etc.), and it gives me such cognitive dissonance.