How Much CO2 Emissions Per Litre of Diesel

When calculating CO₂ emissions the amount of fuel you use is more important than the fuel efficiency of your car/truck/van.

It’s important to know how much CO₂ emissions are created per litre of diesel so you can calculate your overall emissions.

A gas guzzling truck that never gets driven will still use less diesel than a fuel efficient van that is driving all the time.

While fuel efficiency is important you need to look at the quantity of fuel you are burning to understand your impact on global warming.

How Much CO₂ Emissions Per Litre Of Diesel

According to ComCar on average:

a litre of diesel produces 2.6391 kgs of CO₂

a gallon of diesel produces 22.0242 lbs of CO₂

The reason that the emission weight is so high is that oxygen is added to created the CO₂ when the fuel is burned. Thus making the emission weight much higher than the starting weight of the fuel.

How Much Diesel For 1 Tonne of CO₂ Emissions?

To emit 1 tonne of CO₂ into the atmosphere requires burning 378.92 litres of diesel.

To emit 1 ton of CO₂ into the atmosphere requires burning 90.81 gallons of petrol.

While some vehicles produce less CO₂ emissions than others this rough guide should suffice for most people’s use.

Petrol is slightly different. Click here to see how much CO₂ emissions petrol produces.

How To Calculate How Much CO₂ Emissions Your Car Creates

Calculating the CO₂ emissions you create when you drive is easy.

Just simply keep track of how much fuel you put into your tank each time you fill up.

The calculation is:

number of litres x 2.6391 = kgs of CO₂ emissions

or:

number of gallons x 22.0242 = lbs of CO₂ emissions

So if I fill up 80L of diesel I can assume I just used 80L of diesel. So the emmissions I created would be calculated as

80 x 2.6391 = 211.13 kgs of CO₂ emissions

How To Calculate CO₂ Emissions per 100km

People love to talk about fuel efficiency in Litres/100km for some reason.

Calculating your CO₂ emissions per 100km isn’t too hard.

First find out how much fuel your car uses per 100km then times by 2.6391 (the kgs of CO₂ emissions created per litre of fuel).

For example my Mercedes-Benz Sprinter is estimate to use 11.7L/100km.

11.7 x 2.6391 = 30.88 kgs of CO₂ emissions per 100km

As mentioned about this isn’t going to be as accurate or informative as simply calculating petrol usage at the pump and working out your carbon emissions that way, but it does help you to choose driving at more fuel efficient car whenever you can.