This week on the pod, we ask whether we should really care about Taylor Swift’s private jet, or whether we’re missing the bigger picture when it comes to our own carbon footprints.

Stefan Gössling, professor of tourism at Linnaeus University and human ecology at Lund University, joins us to break down the environmental impact of private aviation, how carbon emissions are calculated, and why some travel choices matter a lot more than others. We also get into whether individual carbon-footprint tracking is useful, why we may be obsessing over plastic bags while overlooking bigger sources of emissions, and what people can actually do to make a difference.

Are we putting too much responsibility on individuals while letting bigger contributors off the hook? And when it comes to climate change, how much difference can our personal choices really make compared with changes to transportation, energy, and infrastructure? Stefan helps separate the numbers from the noise and explains where our efforts might have the greatest impact.

Stefan Gössling is a professor of tourism at Linnaeus (le knee us) University in Sweden and a professor of human ecology at Lund University. His research focuses on tourism, transportation, aviation, and climate change, with particular attention to the environmental impact of travel, aviation emissions, carbon footprints, sustainable tourism, and the relationship between individual travel choices and broader climate policy. Stefan has published extensively on the climate impact of air travel and private aviation and has held visiting professorships in Australia, New Zealand, Germany, and Sweden. He has been named a Clarivate Highly Cited Researcher every year from 2020 through 2025, ranked #9 globally in tourism and #2 in sustainable tourism by ScholarGPS in 2025, and included on Reuters' 2021 list of the world's most influential climate academics.