What is your carbon footprint? It’s the effect that you (or your family, organization or business) have on the climate in terms of the amount of greenhouse gases you produce (usually measured in units of carbon dioxide).
It´s very important to know what your carbon footprint is because if you want to help with the global warming crisis you have to know how your lifestyle is contributing to the acceleration of climate change. Once you know this information, you could say that your number one step to helping our planet is complete.
There are many ways in which you leave carbon emission on a daily basis mostly when using energy that comes from non-renewable resources such as coal, oil and natural gas. You regularly generate carbon emissions when heating or cooling your home and office, when you turn on lights, when you use any electrical appliances, when you drive, among others. You also generate carbon emissions indirectly when purchasing food, clothing, cosmetics and household products. Carbon dioxide is generated with the production of most manufactured goods but it becomes greater when the product is transported long distances. Deforestation is an important factor contributing to the increase of levels of carbon dioxide because trees help to convert carbon dioxide into oxygen. It is important to know which foods and paper products contribute in a negative way to climate change in our planet.
In EcoFanatics we want you to know the impact that you and your family cause to the environment and the easiest way to do this is by using online calculators. We recommend the following:
- http://www.nature.org/greenliving/carboncalculator/
- http://www.carbonfootprint.com
- http://footprint.wwf.org.uk
By calculating your carbon emission footprint it will give you a good approximate total of the impact you’re causing so once you´ve completed this step you can be proud of yourself because you have accomplished the first step of helping our environment.
Personally this helped me create conscience about the environment when I did my carbon emission test, I found out I was actually causing a lot of damage to our planet by not recycling paper products and plastic. Form now on I tend to use sheets of paper on both sides when writing and printing.
“Nature provides a free lunch, but only if we control our appetites”. ~William Ruckelshaus.