Carbon Footprint: Everyone and Everything has one.

If you know about the Carbon Footprints, you might want to skip to the post on Business Carbon Footprint issues…..

In this post:

above picture: Carbon Dioxide Surface Concentration as modeled by NASA GEOS for Nov 21, 2015.  Carbon Dioxide Concentration at Surface – The lighter the area, the more CO₂ https://www.facebook.com/EarthWindMap

CO₂  = Carbon  Footprint >>>What…. Why……

Do you know what this is all about?   I found an article about Carbon Footprint, that puts it something like this:
Read through any article about climate change, and you are likely to come across the term “carbon footprint.”  It comes up so often.  Clearly the authors think your CO₂ footprint is something you need to be concerned about.  But what they do not always bother to tell you is what is your CO₂ footprint and why it’s so important.
The first question is pretty simple to answer: Your carbon footprint is the sum of all the greenhouse gas emissions you produce through your day-to-day activities.  It is called a carbon footprint because the main greenhouse gas involved in climate change is carbon dioxide, orCO₂.

Why is it so important?

The second question is a bit more complicated. The short answer to “why it is so important” is that it shows how much you personally contribute to climate change.  Your CO₂ footprint is your vote to muck-up/impact our climate – whether you like it or not.  It is a rough indicator of how much energy you use and how much other natural resources you use up.  So your carbon footprint is a good measure of how green your lifestyle is in general.  If your carbon footprint is big, just think about All the Carbon Footprints for the products you manufacture.

If this is fairly new to you, maybe look at it on a personal basis, as a consumer.  Then consider your business.  Ms. Amy Livingston’s article for MoneyCrashers does a good job of discussing both what it is, how you can measure your own foot print and ways that a person can bring her/his carbon footprint as close to neutral as possible.  

Calculating Carbon Footprints

One of the things that Amy talks about is carbon footprint calculators.  There have been hundreds on the internet. This article in Earth911 – is 2019 up-to-date.  I found 3 that give me a very quick idea of my foot print. In some of these, you will need personal data to fill in the calculator fields. Depends upon how accurate you want to be.

• https://climatehero.me/ This is a very new calculator: Welcome to ClimateHero! ClimateHero helps you go carbon neutral in three steps: Step 1: Calculate your carbon footprint in 5 min; Step 2: Reduce your footprint with climate pledges. [You are offered the chance to consider more actions.]; Step 3: Offset your remaining footprint to 200% [An option to chose a eco-project to support with carbon offsets.] this calculator is in English, Swedish, German and Spanish!
  You get a report something like this:
  Hi Lesley​,
  Well done for calculating and reducing your carbon footprint! Here is a summary:
  Your carbon footprint before promises: 4​ tons CO₂/ year
  Your climate promises:
  •​Always ask for an electric vehicle when you rent a car (-0.1​ tons)
  •​ Walk or bike more​​ (-0.1​ tons)
  •​ Eat less beef and lamb (-0.5​ tons)
  •​ Eat more vegetarian food (-0.2​ tons)
  •​ Adopt circular shopping habits​​ (-0.2​ tons)
  Your climate footprint after climate promises is 2.9​ tons CO₂/ year
  …………
• https://footprint.wwf.org.uk Your results are compared with the world and the UK.  This calculator took me almost no time to fill in and then it gave me some graphically interesting information about where I fit into the general picture.
• http://carbonfootprint.c2es.org/  This one is for the US, but if you want to try it, just add any 5 digit zip code.  It asks you to fill in the calculator, add your email address, and then after this make a (no obligation) pledge by clicking some ways to save energy.  This calculator took me 2 minutes to fill in and then it told me where I fit into the general picture.  Then another minute to click some ways to save energy and it sent me two emails:  Your Carbon Footprint Results and Your Pledge to Save Energy and the Environment.
• http://www.footprintcalculator.org It is full of interesting and visual questions, that make you think about what you do. This calculator requires your email and eventually sends you a general email message.  It only took about 3-4 minutes to fill in.  I did it twice and I see that it does store your answers…….
• https://offset.climateneutralnow.org/footprintcalc This is the UN carbon footprint calculator.

People can get rather extreme, if logical, about what one can do:

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3 posts in this series

There are 3 posts in this series on Carbon Footprint:
#1: Carbon Footprint: Everyone and Everything has one.
#2: Do you know Your Business Carbon Footprint?
#3: Shipping’s Carbon Footprint And Your Small Business >> Your Vote

Other relevant posts in Wasterush.info

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The Greenhouse Gases List …..A Re-Review
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#4 We have 12 years to cool off planet Earth?
Industrial Zone – closed-loop networking
“direct air/CO2 capture”
Slow Down ?? Yes – No, Changes Are Urgent , BUT…..
Bhutan – ESG & The Little Kingdom Of Bhutan A carbon sink country!
CLEAN AIR – IS, ALREADY – IN OUR GRASP!
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