What If 1 in 10 People Changed Everyday Habits?

Calculations show individual actions can have a significant impact on reducing carbon emissions.

Published on Feb. 12, 2026

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The Associated Press looked at four everyday behaviors in the U.S. - eating beef, driving gasoline cars, heating homes with natural gas, and buying new clothes. They calculated the emissions reductions if just one in 10 Americans who currently do these things switched to more climate-friendly alternatives like chicken, electric vehicles, heat pumps, and secondhand clothing. The results show tens to hundreds of billions of pounds of carbon pollution could be avoided each year through these small individual changes.

Why it matters

Climate change is often seen as an issue too big for individual action to matter, but these calculations demonstrate that when personal choices add up, the impact can be significant. Small changes in common behaviors like food, transportation, home energy, and clothing can lead to substantial reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

The details

The AP gathered data on the emissions impact of beef production, gasoline vehicles, natural gas furnaces, and new clothing manufacturing. They found that swapping one beef meal per week for chicken, driving an electric vehicle instead of a gas car, replacing a gas furnace with an electric heat pump, and buying secondhand jeans instead of new could each cut hundreds to thousands of pounds of CO2 per person annually. If just 10% of Americans made these switches, the cumulative emissions reductions would be in the billions of pounds per year.

  • The Associated Press analysis was published on February 12, 2026.

The players

Dave Gustafson

Project director at Agriculture & Food Systems Institute.

Dillon Fitch-Polse

Professional researcher and co-director of Bicycling Plus Research Collaborative at the University of California, Davis.

Leah Stokes

Associate professor of environment politics at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Constance Ulasewicz

Consumer and family studies emeritus faculty and lecturer at San Francisco State University.

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What they’re saying

“Beef is a commonly consumed item that has one of the largest carbon footprints per pound. It is probably one of the largest individual choices that people make with regard to what they eat that has a direct impact on personal carbon footprint.”

— Dave Gustafson, Project director at Agriculture & Food Systems Institute

“If a large percentage of people changed a little bit of their travel, then all of a sudden the benefits are huge.”

— Dillon Fitch-Polse, Professional researcher and co-director of Bicycling Plus Research Collaborative at the University of California, Davis

“People's homes are kind of like little fossil fuel power plants that people operate, and they just don't realize that's what they're doing. That's really the collective action thing is for people to understand that there is fossil fuel infrastructure right under their noses in their own homes.”

— Leah Stokes, Associate professor of environment politics at the University of California, Santa Barbara

“What you can do is not throw in the trash. So it's repairing your clothing so you can extend the life, and buying from a secondhand store.”

— Constance Ulasewicz, Consumer and family studies emeritus faculty and lecturer at San Francisco State University

The takeaway

While individual actions alone cannot solve climate change, these calculations show that if millions of people make small changes in common behaviors, the cumulative impact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions can be substantial. Simple switches in food, transportation, home energy, and clothing choices have the potential to avoid billions of pounds of carbon pollution each year.