A comparison
Bag of charcoal and Coffee, one cup
Two figures compared the only honest way: calculated together, so that what they have in common moves them together, and read as how many times larger one is than the other, with a range.
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Side by side, per kilogram
Scenario Resource-only, using FIGARO 2023. Each figure is the middle result of 2,000 runs of the calculation, with the range that holds nine in ten of them beside it, and the grade that range earns.
Bag of charcoal
2.8 × 10⁻¹⁰ per kilogram(1.1–6.6 × 10⁻¹⁰)LOWS-RES · run 2165 · methodology v0.1 · data dv-20261007-44r
One item is one 3 kg bag of lump wood charcoal, without the bag.
Coffee, one cup
2.3 × 10⁻¹⁰ per kilogram(0.90–5.9 × 10⁻¹⁰)LOWS-RES · run 2165 · methodology v0.1 · data dv-20261007-44r
One item is one Italian espresso — 25 mL in the cup — as the Istituto Nazionale Espresso Italiano defines it.
Which is larger
The model cannot tell whether Bag of charcoal carries more harm than Coffee, one cup per kilogram: the range includes both possibilities.
Bag of charcoal against Coffee, one cup, per kilogram: ×1.2 as much, and very probably (nine times in ten) between ×0.33–×4.4.
In 100% of the runs calculated together, Bag of charcoal comes out above Coffee, one cup.
Calculated together: the same records of harm, the same split of each industry and the same world production in every run, and each product’s own list of materials. Seeing whether two separate ranges overlap would prove nothing either way.
The reason they differ
Deaths per kilogram of each product, by what carries them, with the largest difference first.
By raw material
| Material | Bag of charcoal | Coffee, one cup | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wood charcoal | 2.8 × 10⁻¹⁰ | 0 | +2.8 × 10⁻¹⁰ |
| Coffee | 0 | 2.3 × 10⁻¹⁰ | −2.3 × 10⁻¹⁰ |
By country where the harm was counted
| Country | Bag of charcoal | Coffee, one cup | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Congo, Dem. Rep. | 2.4 × 10⁻¹⁰ | 8.3 × 10⁻¹¹ | +1.6 × 10⁻¹⁰ |
| Colombia | 8.0 × 10⁻¹³ | 1.0 × 10⁻¹⁰ | −1.0 × 10⁻¹⁰ |
| Mexico | 0 | 3.6 × 10⁻¹¹ | −3.6 × 10⁻¹¹ |
| Thailand | 1.7 × 10⁻¹¹ | 1.2 × 10⁻¹² | +1.6 × 10⁻¹¹ |
| United States | 8.3 × 10⁻¹² | 4.3 × 10⁻¹² | +4.0 × 10⁻¹² |
| Argentina | 1.8 × 10⁻¹² | 0 | +1.8 × 10⁻¹² |
| Spain | 1.2 × 10⁻¹² | 0 | +1.2 × 10⁻¹² |
| Panama | 5.2 × 10⁻¹⁴ | 9.4 × 10⁻¹³ | −8.8 × 10⁻¹³ |
Middle estimates. The range above belongs to the totals; these rows show where the middle difference comes from.
By the money method
- Bag of charcoal — 6.7 × 10⁻⁷ per €1,000 spent in its industry(0.44–1.0 × 10⁻⁶)MEDIUMS-RES · run 2165 · methodology v0.1 · data dv-20261007-44r
- Coffee, one cup — 3.9 × 10⁻⁷ per €1,000 spent in its industry(2.6–5.8 × 10⁻⁷)MEDIUMS-RES · run 2165 · methodology v0.1 · data dv-20261007-44r
Shown, not ranked. Measured per euro, most industries are too close to tell apart, and two products from the same industry always get the same figure per euro.
What this figure is not
Production phase only. Harm from using the product — driving the car, charging the phone — is not in this figure.
HumanToll 2026, run 2165, methodology v0.1. https://quiescence.eu/humantoll/compare/charcoal-bag/coffee-cup/