Seriously now, will any of this make a difference?

Reasonable people can disagree about the role of policy versus individual action in addressing climate change — but from my perspective, the answer to this one is: absolutely yes.

Of course, you don’t have to just take my word for it. This is one of those cases where a picture is worth a thousand words, in the form of a “Sankey chart” that shows how various types of energy usage contribute to greenhouse gas emissions (based on 2016 data):

Here’s another version if you’re more a “circle” person than an “arrow” person:

Residential buildings? About 10.9% of emissions. Road transportation? Another 11.9%. Do you live in a building and travel over roads? Then just that fast, you’re at 22.8% of global greenhouse gas emissions, already almost a quarter of the total. That math doesn’t even include “fugitive” emissions, the emissions that occur as energy makes its way to you (such as methane leaks from natural gas production and pipelines); aviation (which is primarily passenger transport); emissions from landfills and wastewater; and emissions connected to producing your food supply.

Of course, if you live in a developed country, the math gets even scarier.  Again based on 2016 data, the top 10 emitting countries in the world – China, the United States, the European Union (okay, a region), India, Russia, Japan, Brazil, Indonesia, Iran, and South Korea – are the source of almost 70% of global greenhouse gas emissions.  On a per person basis, meanwhile, countries like Australia, Canada, and the United States jump well ahead of places like India and China where total emissions are in part a result of the sheer size of the population. So if you’re an average person in the United States, you’re likely to be part of the problem. But that means you can be part of the solution too.

Will following these steps save me money?

Total honesty time: I’m not sure. No one can be — one of the first tidbits I learned when I got into the energy field was that if someone could actually predict energy prices accurately, they’d be rich and wouldn’t bother spending their time giving the rest of us forecasts. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t tools you can use to figure out if a given energy investment could plausibly pay off in terms of dollars and cents.

First, I will remind you that there are some shortcuts here: if a product has the ENERGY STAR label, that means some engineers have done the math to show the long term savings will generally offset a higher up-front purchase price. Similarly, government or utility incentives for a particular technology or rate are often based on some analysis showing that the program will, on average, benefit its participants.

Second, the world seems to be realizing this is a reasonable question to ask and coming up with tools that let you run the numbers yourself based on various assumptions. I’ve come across options for the major categories of home heating and cooling (here and here), water heaters, and electric vehicles. If none of those strike your fancy, try a web search for the type of product you have in mind paired with the terms “cost calculator” or “savings calculator,” and you may well be able to find a way to analyze the potential financial effects of different choices. When it comes to switching utility rates, if your energy company knows what they’re doing, they should offer some type of rate calculator that lets you look at the potential bill impacts — although keep in mind those impacts may change if you follow Step Three to move your future energy use to times when electricity is cheaper.

Note my liberal use of “on average” and “potential.” There are a lot of moving parts here when it comes to energy costs, weather, your own behavior, and more. And especially when it comes to the impacts of different rates, it’s important to remember that you can control your own destiny to the extent you can change your own energy use to take advantage of lower electricity costs at certain times. (Again, Step Three.) So when it comes to this question, my suggestion is to look for a directional sense of whether something is likely to save you money, trying out a few different key assumptions - but not to sweat the small stuff. If you’re a median U.S. household spending about $2,000 a year total on utilities like electricity and natural gas, being off by a couple percentage points for energy costs for one particular appliance may equate to just a few dollars a month. Think about how that fits into the context of your overall climate budget before you decide if it’s an amount that makes a difference.

What can I do as a renter?

I’ve tried to cover this in each of the steps, but to summarize: change what you can and talk about what you can’t. If you can switch to a carbon-free energy supply or an electric vehicle (for regular drivers), those are already big steps in the right direction. For the rest, do a little research on what you can productively talk to your landlord about. You can start with the Step-by-Step Worksheets for a short list of things you might want to do and/or that your landlord might be able to help with. In a lot of places, there are special government or utility programs to support renter access to energy efficiency measures, EV charging, or solar energy, particularly in multifamily buildings where there could be real barriers to overcome. To the extent those resources exist, they’re most likely to go to the places where the tenants ask for them. If you can’t find anything along those lines, I’ll point you to the Politics and Prejudice section for advice on how to push policymakers in the right direction.

Above all, keep in mind that you have one big advantage over homeowners: you’re not as stuck in one spot. You can move to a home that’s a better fit for your climate goals, or help your landlord understand what they need to do to keep you where you are. That’s not a bad place to be.