Global Swarming

Is it time for Americans to start cutting our baby emissions?

…What’s the environmental cost of having a child? In the crudest terms, you’ve added another version of yourself into the world, which means you’re potentially doubling your carbon-dioxide emissions over the total life of your family. That’s a high estimate, since our kids won’t spew as much greenhouse gas as we do


Our other green lifestyle choices can’t even begin to offset the cost of adding a brand-new CO2-emitter to the population. When I ran my own numbers through Al Gore’s carbon calculator, I discovered that a switch to 100 percent wind and solar power would reduce my emissions by just 1.3 tons per year. That’s not even enough to account for one quarter of today’s average American. Meanwhile, I’d have to do quite a bit of driving around in a Hummer H3 to mimic the environmental impact of creating another version of me. Not to mention the fact that my children might eventually decide to have their own children, who would emit even more carbon dioxide down the line.

Slate