Written by Umang Saini
on 

Million

My personal expenses crossed a key milestone last December - One Million Indian Rupees.
Following are few key stats -
It took 2012 days @ Rs. 497 per day to cross the first million.

Where the money went?
  • Travel and Commute - 22% (5.8% Bus, 1.2% Indian Railways, 10% Airlines (2% Jet Airways))
  • Food - 18%
  • GOI Direct Taxes - 16%
  • Rent - 16%
  • Electronics - 14.5% (Dell 7.1%, ASUS 2.4%, Canon 1.6%, Sony 1.5%, Apple 1.3%, WD 0.4%)
  • Internet - 2.1%
  • Movies - 0.25%
  • Digital Music - 0.008%
The largest chunk of went to local and central government - 16% direct taxes, 2.5% government transport, 7-8% indirect taxes = ~26%
The second largest chunk went to Domestic Airline Carriers - 10% 
The third largest chunk went to US Consumer Electronic giants - Dell etc. - 8.7%
The fourth largest chunk went to East-Asian CE companies - Canon etc. - 5.5%

Intensity
By rough (back of the envelope) calculation my personal GHG emissions stand at ~3 metric tons per year, for a grand total of 16.5 metric tons of emissions in 5.5 years (5.8 for flying alone!).

Rs. 1 million = USD 22,000 led to 16.5 metric tons emissions.
$1 million = 750 metric tons GHG. And, after taking PPP into account, the final figure comes out to be 263 metric tons per $1m

For USA the carbon intensity for 2007 by WRI is 450 metric tons GHG per million dollars. Europe / California are in 300-320 metric tons GHG per million dollars range. (China 1000, India 482 in 2007)

How can one reduce carbon intensity further?
  • Spending less on carbon intensive industries - Electronics and Flying
  • Spending more on carbon efficient / neutral activities - Local Food, Carbon Offsets
I may purchase offsets @ ~$15 per ton, which would cost <1% of the total expenses to be carbon neutral!

Next Million
At my current run rate, the next Million-Rupee expense mark would come much sooner. I am projecting ~2 years.

--
US
p.s. - These exclude company expenses, investments and externalities arising from them.