Which pollutes more, a car or an airplane?

Question

Which pollutes more, a car or an airplane?

Answer 1

Todays large airplanes with winglets that travel long distances and are over 75% seated, usually return about 60 pmpg or passenger miles per gallon.  The shorter the trip, the less the pmpg.  This is because the most fuel is used to climb to 35,000+ feet.

So if you need to travel more than about 500 miles, and your car gets less than 60 mpg, you will leave less of a carbon footprint to take a large airplane.

I hope that answers your question.

Answer 2

Cars- They are a greater cause of global warming than airplanes are or ever will be.  Cars release 50 million tons of C02 into the air every day while planes only release a mere 5 million

Answer 3

depends on the car or airplane...

Al Gore's jet pollutes more than my car.

Answer 4

Planes exhaust a lot more at one time than any car, but they also move people and large amounts of cargo large distances in a relatively short time.   To do the same job as an airplane would require probably a dozen large trucks driving for several days continuously.  So a more fair question would be: Which pollutes more, one airplane or the fleet of trucks that would be required to do the same job?

I'm still betting that the airplane is more fuel efficient, mostly due to the fact that it can go in essentially a straight line.  Also, there are no school zones or red lights in the sky.

Hope this helps!

Answer 5

cars only because there are many more

Answer 6

car

Answer 7

A single car compared to a single plane.  The plane is the highest polluter.

World wide, all cars and all planes, the car is the biggest polluter due its massive numbers.

Answer 8

An airplane.  It's not close.

Which pollutes more, all cars or all airplanes?

All cars.  It's not close.

Answer 9

how many of each

An airplane it hundred times bigger than a car

but there are billions mor cars

each on its own gotta be the airplane

but that doesnt count in reality

we have to considder the collective effects.

Answer 10

Airplane travel really elevates your carbon footprint - more so than a car.

Flying cross country in a plane will pollute far more per person than driving in a car.

Answer 11

Per vehicle or per passenger?

Answer 12

According to National Geographic, Per person, An Airplane uses more fuel than a car does, especially on filled ot capacity.  Trains use the least.

Answer 13

An Airplane, it use alot more fuel.  And therefore produces more emissions.

Answer 14

If you're comparing a single airplane with a single car, I'd have to say the airplane.

An airplane dumps out "carbon dioxide (CO 2 ), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), and nitrogen oxides (NO x ) into the atmosphere, as well as dump toxic chemicals--used to de-ice airplanes during winter storms--into waterways."

Answer 15

A airplane, a car and diesel trucks.

Answer 16

depends... in the long run, probably a car... in a span of a couple of days, most likely a plane... but total there are more cars in the world and more feul by them so care win this one

Answer 17

No mater what type of plane it is the biggest of the two.

Up until recently all of the small type planes used a LEADED

fuel. This put lead into the atmosphere. The commercial jet use What is call JP4 this is a high grade kerosene. This is a high sulfur fuel. The only thing is the amount of vehicles in the US far out way the planes in oxide emissions that planes produce. They need to get better control of emissions so are children can have a breath.

Answer 18

A car.

Answer 19

Airplanes pollute a heck lot more than a car does. It uses up a ton of fuel. Plus, it goes in the air, so it must use a lot of fuel for that. Jet exhaust is actually one of the top 5 polluters in the world.

Answer 20

Without a doubt it would be the Airplane.  Because the fuel that an airplane uses is much worse for the environment.