Carbon Footprint of the Galapagos Islands – Quantifying the Environmental Impact of Tourist Activities
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esd-wp-2012-15.pdf
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547.26 KB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
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Author(s)
Cordova-Vallejo, Ximena M.
Blanco, Edgar E.
Yang, Xu
Ponce-Cueto, Eva
Date Issued
June 2012
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Engineering Systems Division
Series/Report no.
ESD Working Papers;ESD-WP-2012-15
Abstract
The main goal of this paper is to quantify the green house gas emissions (also referred to as carbon footprint) of the Galapagos Islands. The analysis includes emissions from energy generation and of related economic activities of the tourism industry, including international travel to the islands. We have also included the green house gas emission generated by the transportation of fuel, food, supplies and water from Ecuador mainland to Galapagos Islands across multiple modes. We estimated a total carbon footprint of 532,373 tones of CO2-eq, of which 68.82% corresponds to international air travel, 17.86% corresponds to fuel consumption for energy generation and 6.01% due to transportation of food from mainland to the islands. These emissions were allocated between residents and tourists to outline strategies for a sustainable tourism management in the islands.
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