How do I calculate the carbon footprint of a disposable syringe?
Add the polypropylene barrel and plunger, rubber gasket and needle per syringe with supplier figures. Add moulding, assembly, printing, packing and sterilisation energy, then divide by syringes packed.
Materials
- Polypropylene barrel and plunger.
- Rubber gasket and stainless steel needle.
- Blister paper and film.
Process
- Injection moulding in clean rooms.
- Assembly, printing and blister packing.
- Sterilisation by ethylene oxide or radiation.
Per piece
Report per syringe by size. Clean room air handling can be a large share of plant electricity, so meter it.
Worked example: disposable syringe unit per piece (one month)
- Electricity: 60,000 kWh x 0.710 = 42,600 kg CO2
- Syringes packed: 2,000,000
- Plant total: 42,600 / 2,000,000 = 0.0213 kg CO2 per piece
- Add polymer, needle and packing for the full figure
Inputs are illustrative; use your own bills and production records.
What Senseible does here
Senseible reads the plant's electricity bills (CEA grid factor 0.710 kg CO2 per kWh, CO2 Baseline Database version 21.0) and fuel invoices (IPCC 2006 defaults) into a fingerprinted Scope 1 and 2 record, the plant-level input to a per-unit figure. Bought-in materials go to the supplier evidence trail; product reports are self-declared drafts.
- Product carbon footprint calculator
- Injection moulding footprint
- Surgical instrument footprint
- Chemical industry
Sources: GHG Protocol Product Standard, ISO 14067:2018, Carbon footprint of products (iso.org), IPCC 2006 Guidelines, Volume 2 Energy (fuel defaults), CEA CO2 Baseline Database, version 21.0
Last reviewed 2026-10-20.