Impact Calculator
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Impact calculator
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What is 0.5 kg CO₂ per day?
That's what an average human exhales just by breathing.
Our bodies burn food for energy and release carbon dioxide with every breath. At rest an adult produces about 200 mL of CO₂ per minute, which adds up to roughly half a kilogram every day. We use this as a simple, human-scale yardstick for the carbon your recycling keeps out of the air.
CO₂ produced at rest
Resting metabolism
CO₂ exhaled per day
~290 litres of gas
CO₂ exhaled per year
Just from breathing
👕 How we calculate textile impact
Impact factors by fabric (per kg):
These factors represent CO₂ saved by diverting textiles from landfill vs. producing new fabric
Where each number comes from
Carbon saved — textile life-cycle studies (Ellen MacArthur Foundation, WRAP).
Water saved — cotton water footprint ~10,000 L/kg (Water Footprint Network; WWF).
Energy saved — textile LCA studies and European Environment Agency briefings.
Breathing (0.5 kg CO₂/day) — resting metabolic CO₂ output of an adult (~200 mL/min).
Careful estimates to show the scale of your impact, not exact measurements.
🔬 Human breathing: Scientific basis
- • Resting output: an adult body produces about 200 mL of CO₂ per minute (VCO₂, the resting metabolic rate used in respiratory physiology)
- • Daily total: 200 mL/min × 1,440 min ≈ 290 litres of CO₂ per day
- • By weight: 290 L × 1.98 g/L (density of CO₂) ≈ 0.5 kg CO₂ per day at rest
- • Annual estimate: 0.5 kg/day × 365 days ≈ 183 kg CO₂ per year (rises toward ~1 kg/day with physical activity)
Based on: resting metabolic CO₂ production (VCO₂ ≈ 200 mL/min) from human respiratory physiology; the ~1 kg/day figure for an active adult is widely cited by the BBC and science educators.
By recycling textiles, you're preventing the carbon equivalent of many months of human breathing from entering the atmosphere.
Every kilogram of textile you recycle saves CO₂ that would have been released if that fabric ended up decomposing in landfills.