In 2013, physical gift cards have an estimated annual CO2 footprint of 585,300 tons. That’s more than all the daily air flights in Europe combined.

What’s worse is that 8%-19% of all gift cards go unused. There are many digital options for sending a gift card; digital gift cards have a significantly reduced footprint compared to physical cards, so the environmental impact of gifting could easily be reduced.

Total CO2: 585,300 tons

Here are the numbers in detail:

Number of gift cards produced annually	Production CO2 21g/card [1]	Packaging CO2 10-15g/card [1]	Transport CO2 28.9g/card [1]	Transaction CO2 0.2g/CO2 [2]	Incineration CO2(+33% emissions) [1]	Total CO2(58.53 g/card)
10 Billion [3] [4]	210,000 tons	10,000-15,000 tons	289,000 tons	2,000 tons	69,300 tons	585,300 tons

[1] “What’s the carbon footprint of your credit card?” Jay MacDonald. May 9, 2009. creditcards.com.
[2] “Eco-friendly initiatives focus on plastic gift cards” by Cindy Waxer. May 8, 2009. creditcards.com.
[3] Environmental Impact of Gift Cards. giftah.com.
[4] “Google discloses carbon footprint for the first time” Duncan Clarke. Sept 8, 2011. guardian.co.uk

Notes on figures:

1. 1. The International Card Manufacturers Association provides a different figure of 9.34g of CO2eq (section 7.4.2.2) for a single PVC card although its unclear whether that figure includes energy and water consumed to produce the raw materials. MacDonald cites those cost on his figure of 21g of CO2eq / card.
2. 2. Estimates for total CO2 footprint for Packaging include only end consumer packaging. Value could decrease or increase depending on packaging used (i.e. gift card holders, wrapping paper, etc.)
3. 3. Estimates for transport costs based on long-haul air travel provided in MacDonald’s article. The figure provided in the table is an estimate that illustrates the share transportation comprises in the overall CO2 footprint of gift cards. Transport costs are difficult to determine or even average across the industry. Transportation can occur at any stage in the product life cycle: raw materials extraction, factory production, chip/magnetic strip integration, company branding, storage at distribution centres, retail deliveries, and disposal. The International Card Manufacturers Association breaks down the CO2 emissions of different means of transportation (see table 3).
4. 4. The figure for transactions assumes a single transaction for each gift card. The figure provided in the table is an estimate that illustrates the share transactions comprises in the overall CO2 footprint of gift cards. There are no clear figures for the cost in electricity and transmission systems to maintain the servers and network infrastructure necessary for POS gift card transactions. The energy audit conducted by Google provides an analogy for the cost of a single transaction across a network.
5. 5. The figure for incinerating cards assumes that all gift card waste will be incinerated. This figure does not account for the percent of cards that recycled, reuses, made from biodegradable plastics, or disposed in landfills. No figures currently exist for how many cards are incinerated but it should be noted that CO2 costs associated with recycling materials and biodegrading plastics may exceed the figures for incineration. Moreover, gift cards disposed in landfills account for 34,000-45,000 tons (75-100 pounds) of toxic plastic waste entering landfills resulting in carcinogens and toxins including chlorine residue and heavy-metal pollutants.
6. 6. Total CO2 estimates subject to the same variance identified with other figures in table. The totals illustrates that 5.07g card can account for 58g of additional CO2—and increase of 1,150% over the lifetime of the product. Comparing that figure to 0.2g CO2/transaction for a digital only transaction gives an advantage of 29,200% for digital gift cards over physical ones.
7. 7. Total CO2 estimates can also be lowered by the increase use of digital gift cards. TowerGroup estimates that 8.7% of gift cards will be digital by 2015 ($12 billion of a total $138 billion industry)

 

More Impacts than just Carbon Footprint

PCV cards weigh 5.07 g. 10 billion gift cards created annually equal 50,700 tons of plastic that will either enter a landfill, be incinerated, or require additional energy and production costs to recycle. “What’s the carbon footprint of your credit card?”

Taken from “What is the Environmental Impact of Plastic Gift Cards” Infographic produced by giftdish.com.

• 2.3 million trees needed to offset CO2 from production and transport of gift cards from 2005-2012.
• 2012 production, packaging, transport of gift cards equivalent to 14,560 cars
• In 2012, 37 million L (10,000,000 gal) of water needed to produce and package gift cards

Other Physical Gift Card Statistics

One of the top hits on Google regarding the environmental impact of waste is this Gift Rocket infographic. This group also uses the information from MacDonald’s article, but their estimates on the size of the gift card market are too small. They use the total size of the market (in 2009) $80 billion for the whole year but divide by an average for the Christmas season of $50/card. Most sources cite 10 billion gift cards (17 billion plastic cards including credit cards and phone cards). TowerGroup’s estimate that the number of gift cards sold in 2012 would measure 5,318,813 miles long assumes the sale of 10 billion gift cards, although it seems unlikely that this is US only as they state.