As Las Vegas wrapped up its first Super Bowl weekend the biggest news was that Taylor Swift was there. In the days preceding, the world’s Swifties waited with bated breath. How would Taylor make it to the big game to watch Travis Kelce play? Would she have time to make it from her show in Tokyo to the game in Las Vegas? Would there be a parking space available for her private jet? Who would she be hanging out with her in her fancy stadium viewing box? Of course she made it to the game, the Kansas City Chiefs won the championship and America’s new favorite couple had the perfect fairy tale moment.
Following the game discussions lingered, not only around the game, but around Swift’s preferred mode of travel. It’s been reported that her Dassault Falcon 900LX private jet may have expelled 200,000 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions in order to watch Kelce’s big game in Las Vegas, about 14 times the amount of CO2 expelled by an entire average American household during an entire year. Of course even the average American is a prolific carbon consumer, emitting nearly three times the CO2 as the average United Kingdom subject and nearly 150 times as much as the average Nigerian. For those keeping tally, Taylor Swift’s Super Bowl travel alone emitted nearly 1,000 times the amount of CO2 the average Nigerian will emit during an entire year.
Travel by air plays an outsized role in CO2 emissions and other climate warming effects. Las Vegas arguably plays an outsized role in promoting air travel, luring throngs of tourists to its hotels, casinos and other entertainment venues. During Super Bowl weekend alone, Las Vegas lured 882 private jets to town. Commercial travel to Las Vegas broke records with 103,978 passengers screened through airport security Monday after the game.
The Super Bowl was only a single large event in a city that hosts dozens. Formula One alone brought more than 1,200 private jets. But commercial airlines brought in most of the 40.8 million who visited Las Vegas during 2023.
As a city built in the middle of a desert, climate change is already having an outsized impact on Las Vegas. Las Vegas has been the fastest warming city in the U.S. since 1970, resulting in more frequent and more severe heat waves. As seasonal rainfall patterns have shifted, Las Vegas has become more vulnerable to severe flooding. Our primary source of water, Lake Mead, has been under mounting pressure as evaporation increases and seasonal snowpack in the mountains above the Colorado Basin decreases. Las Vegas is already beginning to lose the battle against climate change, yet we vehemently promote human behaviors that contribute to climate change.
Which brings us back to Taylor Swift.
While Taylor Swift was only a single passenger who flew to Las Vegas for Super Bowl weekend, the media’s attention to her flight helps illuminate the larger picture of how Americans consume, how these consumption patterns impact our communities and how we may better combat climate change.
The key to saving our planet (and Las Vegas) is not figuring out how to shuffle material, tourists, and pop stars around the globe more efficiently but rather figuring out how to fulfill our human needs more locally. Supporting local musicians and artists creates jobs and protects cultural diversity. Consuming local produce supports local farmers, decreases emissions from transportation and provides healthier, fresher food options. Moving away from online vendors such as Amazon could help bring back the small local storefronts along Main Street that many of us sorely miss.
A return to localism would help with a host of other problems as well. Most of the issues that affect us day to day are local issues managed by local governments. Many of our societal challenges could be eased if more of us would just walk across the street and get to know our neighbors. Communities are stronger when we seek to fulfill our basic human needs within those communities and not from afar.
Localism does not come without challenges. We, as a society, have traveled a long way down the road to globalism. It would have a particularly striking impact on Las Vegas, a city whose very existence has historically depended on hordes of tourists escaping to the desert on fossil-fueled flying machines. But even Las Vegans yearn for a community that represents and supports Las Vegans. Las Vegas is a city that has a lot to gain from slowing climate change.
Eric McCammond was brought to Las Vegas by the U.S. Air Force eight years ago. He periodically writes about local and regional issues.
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