Just came across an excellent post from Jamais Cascio on the Carbon Footprint of the Cheeseburger

In summary, he concludes:

To make it clear, then: the greenhouse gas emissions arising every year from the production and consumption of cheeseburgers is roughly the amount emitted by 6.5 million to 19.6 million SUVs. There are now approximately 16 million SUVs currently on the road in the US.

In other words, the average American’s diet of cheeseburgers has more impact that all the SUVs on the road.

His point isn’t just about cheeseburgers, though:

The Cheeseburger Footprint is about much more than raw numbers. It’s about how we live our lives, and the recognition that every action we take, even the most prosaic, can have unexpectedly profound consequences. The article was meant to poke us in our collective ribs, waking us up to the effects of our choices.

There’s also now a video available, from a segment on Six Degrees: