Bill Gates To Fly Less, Eat Synthetic Meat To Reduce His Carbon Footprint

Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist Bill Gates mentioned plans to fly less and eat synthetic meat more often to reduce his carbon footprint in an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit.

ALSO READ: Bill Gates Thinks We Must Stop Eating Beef To Save World From Climate Change

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When asked what people could do to help reduce their carbon footprints on the planet, Bill Gates suggested they should consume less and drive electric cars among other things.

It's a tune that Bill Gates has been harping for some time now, and it's been a consistent theme of his annual Gates Letter that he publishes during the start of the year to set a broad agenda on topics that are close to him.

When asked further, he said, ¡°On the personal front, I am doing a lot more. I am driving electric cars. I have solar panels at my house. I eat synthetic meat (some of the time!). I buy green aviation fuel. I pay for direct air capture by Climeworks. I help finance electric heat pumps in low cost housing to replace natural gas.¡±

ALSO READ: Bill Gates And Jeff Bezos Back Startup For Unlimited Clean Energy Via Nuclear Fusion

Bill Gates also mentioned plans to fly a lot less "now that the pandemic has shown we can get by with less trips."

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A research into the carbon footprint of billionaires published earlier this year revealed that Bill Gates is a ¡°modest¡± polluter according to billionaire standards.

ALSO READ: Bill Gates Owns Lot Of Farmland In America, And Investing Big In Clean Tech

The study, which went through 82 databases of public records to document billionaires¡¯ houses, vehicles, aircraft and yachts, found that the fourth richest man had an annual footprint at 7,493 metric tons of carbon, mostly from a lot of flying.

When another Reddit user requested Bill Gates for his advice to a 19-year-old, he said, ¡°You should learn about climate change. It doesn¡¯t need to be a full time thing ¨C you should pick the job you care about and feel you can contribute to but also have goals that aren¡¯t just about your own success.¡±

ALSO READ: Singapore Becomes 1st Country To Allow Lab-Grown Meat Sale For Human Consumption

Bill Gates has always been vocal about climate change and warned last year in a blog post that climate change could be worse than the Covid-19 pandemic.

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¡°Within the next 40 years, increases in global temperatures are projected to raise global mortality rates by the same amount - 14 deaths per 100,000," he said. "By the end of the century, if emissions growth stays high, climate change could be responsible for 73 extra deaths per 100,000 people. In a lower emissions scenario, the death rate drops to 10 per 100,000."

And those of you who want to read more, you may want to check out his recently published book, ¡®How to Avoid a Climate Disaster¡¯.