Food Miles CO₂ Calculator
Estimate the transport CO₂ behind your food from its weight, distance travelled and mode of transport.
How it works
CO₂ (kg) = (weight ÷ 1000) tonnes × distance (km) × factor (kg per tonne-km)
Food-transport emissions scale with weight, distance and — most of all — the mode. Per tonne-kilometre, air freight is roughly 30 times worse than sea freight, which is why flown-in produce carries an outsized footprint while the same goods by ship barely register. That said, transport is often a small slice of food’s total emissions; how the food was produced usually matters more than how far it travelled.
Worked example
Fifty kilograms of food (0.05 tonnes) carried 1,500 km by truck at 0.1 kg per tonne-km emits 0.05 × 1,500 × 0.1 = 7.5 kg of CO₂. The same trip by air (0.5) would be 37.5 kg; by ship (0.015) just 1.1 kg.
Sources: Our World in Data — Food miles and the carbon footprint of food
Frequently asked questions
Why is air freight so much worse?
Aircraft burn far more fuel per tonne-kilometre than ships or trains, so even short air-freighted distances add large emissions. Highly perishable, out-of-season produce is the most likely to be flown.
Do food miles matter more than diet?
Usually not. For most foods, production emissions dwarf transport, so what you eat matters more than how far it travelled. The big exception is air-freighted perishables.
What do the factors represent?
They are kilograms of CO₂ to move one tonne of goods one kilometre, typical freight averages: about 0.5 for air, 0.1 for road, 0.03 for rail and 0.015 for sea.
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This calculator is for educational purposes. Double-check important results before acting on them.