This week was the first time I've been on a plane for over a year. Although it is possible to get to Northern Ireland by other routes, involving trains and boats, there certainly isn't a quick, cheap alternative to flying and so I flew.
My share of the round trip flight was around 150kg of emitted carbon dioxide. So that's over my own weight in CO2 - even though I could do with losing a few pounds (or stones actually!).
The average UK citizen's 'fair share' of UK annual emissions is about 9 tonnes of CO2 per annum. So my return flight was about one and a half per cent of the average annual emissions of a UK citizen.
By comparison - just that short return flight is equivalent to about the whole per capita annual CO2 emissions of citizens of about 20 nations on Earth - mostly African countries. The average Tanzanian or Ugandan emits less CO2 in a year than I did in just over a day - and we aren't counting my drive to the airport and then home, the TV and lights in the room, the energy that went into heating the water for my shower or cooking the food for my meals.
My father never got on a plane in his life, my Mum was in her 70s when she first flew. I was in my early 20s when I first got on a plane and my children were under 10 on their first flights. That might be progress - it certainly felt like it at the time. But if greenhouse gases are wrecking the climate then it is difficult to see flying as an absolute and unquestionable right.
Tricky!