- Environment
How big is your climate shadow? The concept is emerging to replace the carbon footprint—which critics say is at best time-consuming and, at worst, meaningless.
Published December 18, 2023
5 min read
The enormity of the global climate crisis is so vast that individual actions may seem meaningless: can installing LED lighting in my home or keeping my car tires inflated really help save the polar bears?
One popular tool to help individuals assess their contribution to climate change is a carbon footprint calculator. Hundreds of such calculators are available online, enabling you to input details like what type of transportation you use to get to work, how often you eat red meat, and whether or not you wash your clothes in cold water.
But critics argue that focusing on your carbon footprint is at best time consuming and at worst meaningless. Instead, the “climate shadow” has emerged as a more holistic alternative.
First coined by Portland, Oregon-based writer Emma Pattee, the climate shadow aims to paint a picture of the full sum of one’s choices—and the impact they have on the planet.
What is a climate shadow?
In an article she wrote in 2021, Pattee detailed her concept for measuring an individual’s impact: “[Your climate shadow is] a dark shape stretching out behind you. Everywhere you go, it goes too, tallying not just your air conditioning use and the gas mileage of your car, but also how you vote, how many children you choose to have, where you work, how you invest your money, how much you talk about climate change, and whether your words amplify urgency, apathy, or denial.”
The larger the shadow—the greater an individual’s impact on doing good for the planet.
While your carbon footprint may shrink if you place solar panels on your roof, for example, your climate shadow would, in contrast, grow when talking with your neighbors about your choices. Even the social impact of simply displaying solar panels would influence the size of your shadow. Studies show having neighbors with solar panels pressures nearby residents to install their own.
In other words, rather than incentivizing purely individual actions, your climate shadow grows when those actions inspire others, knowingly or otherwise.
The problem with a carbon footprint
By their nature, carbon footprint calculators highlight individual actions while ignoring the impact of large industries or the role governments play in limiting them. Critics of carbon footprint calculators argue, for example, that they have been coopted by oil companies to shift blame and attention away from them and on to everyday consumers.
“A carbon footprint is a quantitative metric measure of righteousness,” explains Katharine Hayhoe, chief scientist for The Nature Conservancy and a professor at Texas Tech University. “And people use it to feel good about themselves,
