Carbon Footprint of Diving Gear Explained: Scuba Equipment Carbon Emissions

Impact of Diving Fins

If you’re a diver, you know how crucial your diving fins are in traversing the depths, but those are typically made from rubber, another material that has a substantial carbon footprint.

One ton of synthetic rubber creates 2.5 tons of CO₂ emissions.⁹ Not to mention, rubber harvesting leads to deforestation and can negatively impact the environment from the use of machines and petroleum.

Some companies will use sustainable plant-based rubbers, but this is still not a popular practice. Something to consider also is the fact that many divers can lose fins throughout their diving lifetime, and these fins end up in the ocean continuing to leach out toxic chemicals and/or microplastics.

How Your Buoyancy Control Device Can Affect the Environment

A buoyancy control device is a vest with a bladder that can be filled with gas to add buoyancy, and then that gas can be released to lessen the buoyancy. The material used usually involves some kind of rubber and there is typically an aluminum or stainless steel back plate, the production of which lends itself to a greater carbon footprint.

Another way divers will control their buoyancy is through the use of lead weights.

Lead is a toxic material not only for human use but also for wildlife.¹⁰ When left in the water, lead weights can leach out toxic chemicals that can pose a danger to sea creatures.

Other Underwater Sports That Affect the Environment

Another sport that can affect the environment is surfing, because it also uses a wetsuit, and most of those wetsuits can be made of neoprene as well. This also goes for snorkeling, which also uses masks and snorkels that are typically made of rubber or neoprene.

What Is a Carbon Footprint?

To determine the carbon footprint of diving gear we must first answer, what is a carbon footprint? A carbon footprint is the amount of greenhouse gasses that are produced from a given activity.

Your carbon footprint is determined by how much carbon dioxide, methane, and other gasses are produced as a byproduct of your actions.

Most of what we do has a carbon footprint, from eating, which requires agriculture, transportation, and food packaging to driving daily, which accumulates a footprint from the manufacturing of the car and the combustion of the engine.

How To Calculate Your Carbon Footprint

It’s easy to perform a carbon footprint calculation these days since all you need is a carbon emissions calculator.¹

Using a carbon footprint calculator is a simple way for how to calculate carbon footprint manually.

Environmental Considerations When Performing Underwater Sports

Although the carbon footprint of diving gear is important to consider, the scope and effect of diving and underwater sports go far beyond that.

Underwater sports can lead to pollution and harm to various marine life.

Travel and Lodging

Many of the popular diving locations include Hawaii, French Polynesia, New Zealand, The Bahamas, and Mexico. These are typically in more remote locations and therefore require a plane to get to and then lodging to stay at.

Plane travel constitutes up to 3% of global emissions with one passenger having a carbon footprint of 90–109 kg CO₂ per hour (based on a Boeing 747–400).¹¹

Tourism is responsible for 8% of the planet’s carbon emissions,¹² this includes travel, but it also includes lodging, food and beverage, and goods. When you go scuba diving you have to consider that so much more goes into that trip than just the scuba gear and the flight.

Traveling from your hotel to the dive location is also part of it, whether it’s by bus or car.

Corals and Marine Life

Studies show that corals in sites that have moderate to heavy diving activity suffer compared to areas that have no diving activity.¹³ This shows that diving can greatly affect coral reefs, leading to death and coral rubble.

It is also believed that diving is affecting the diversity of these coral species.

Although the reasoning for the effect is varied, it is obvious that an area that has an increase in divers affects the wildlife. It could be through fish feeding, which introduces more sharks into the area and therefore increases activity, or it could be the excessive activity of the divers that leads to damage.

In some cases, it could be divers that touch the coral without consideration. In some cases, it could be the result of divers simply resting their knees or their fins on the ground,¹⁴ not knowing it was damaging the coral.

Disrupting coral with fins and dragging of gauges and lines shows that aside from the carbon footprint of diving gear, there are also physical effects from the equipment. Issues with buoyancy control can lead to bumping into coral.

Ways To Cut Down on the Carbon Footprint of Diving Gear

Here are the different ways you can do to minimize the carbon footprint of diving gear.

Proper Training

In order to do well for the environment you have to know the proper techniques for diving that won’t harm the environment you are swimming in, especially corals, which are delicate and necessary for the world.

Proper training will also teach you how to safely traverse the depths so that you don’t disrupt the wildlife or the deep sea structures where so many species find a home.

Rent Diving Gear

Rent scuba diving equipment instead of buying it. The more people purchase equipment, the higher the demand, and therefore the more that is produced, which greatly increases the carbon footprint of diving gear.

Most popular locations have rental stores, and those stores typically offer guided diving tours.

Properly Dispose of Diving Gear

One of the many struggles, especially with neoprene material, is what to do with old wetsuits. Most wetsuits are either thrown into a landfill or incinerated; landfills can see up to 400 tons of wetsuits annually and some numbers even suggest up to 9,200 tons.^15,16

When left in the sun these suits can leak carbon black, which enters the air, soil, and water leading to toxicity.

The other solution is incineration, which requires energy and emits toxic chemicals into the air that could also enter the water and soil.

An alternative is to recycle your neoprene wetsuits, giving them to companies that will turn them into new materials. For instance, some companies have locations in Australia, the USA, and Europe that will turn old wetsuits into soft fall mats.¹⁷

Another company turns wetsuits into beverage sleeves while Suga turns wetsuits into yoga mats.^18,19

Respect the Environment

Most divers know this, but it bears repeating; always respect the areas you visit.

Ensure that you are leaving it just as clean and pristine as you encountered it, if not cleaner. Clean up all of your belongings and ensure it is all sent to a proper receptacle.

All of your diving equipment should be properly put away and not left, since they could end up in the ocean and lead to toxic leaching or could just have it all end up in the ocean.

Don’t touch delicate wildlife, including coral. Diving in the ocean can lead to excessive motion that can damage coral, but divers should exercise self-control and avoid touching all marine animals,²⁰ especially those that are endangered or delicate.

Handling animals may not hurt them physically, but could trigger stress responses in the animals that could affect their feeding and sleeping habits.²¹

Choose Diving Spots That Are Closer

Many of the popular diving spots require traveling long distances and their beauty is what attracts large numbers of divers to the area like the Republic of Palau.

Not only is it the plane travel to these places that contribute to a carbon footprint, as mentioned above, but it is also the vast numbers of people and a heavy focus on these areas. In order to take pressure off of these locations, it may be better to diversify diving areas.

Are There Environmentally Friendly Companies To Rent From?

Yes, there are green-focused diving companies to choose from as well depending on where you plan on going. Some of them can be found in Egypt,²² Hawaii,²³ Phuket,²⁴ and the Philippines.²⁵

Renting equipment from companies like these is helpful in lowering the carbon footprint of diving gear.

Offsetting Your Carbon Footprint

If you are looking to offset your carbon footprint, in general, there are a multitude of ways. One way is by looking at our carbon offset projects and following our lead to plant trees.

Planting trees is the best way to deal with CO₂ emissions, since trees serve to use up carbon dioxide and transform it into oxygen.

One tree can absorb 48 lbs of CO₂ from the air annually, on average.²⁶ Check out our Tree Carbon Calculator to see how age and size affect a tree’s CO₂ capture ability.

While diving gear can harm the environment, we can help by choosing to be more eco-friendly.

This will help keep our oceans safe for a long time and reduce the bad effects of the carbon footprint of diving gear on the environment.

Frequently Asked Questions About the Carbon Footprint of Diving Gear