A carbon footprint is a measure of the impact our lifestyle has on the environment. It relates to the amount of greenhouse gases produced in our daily activities through burning fossil fuels for electricity, heating, and transportation etc. and has units of tones of carbon dioxide equivalent.
A carbon footprint consists of two parts: the primary footprint and the secondary footprint. The primary footprint is the assessment of an individual’s direct CO2 emissions by the burning of fossil fuels for domestic energy or transportation. Additionally, people are in complete control of these factors. The secondary footprint measures the indirect CO2 emissions of a person’s material possessions, starting from their manufacture to their breakdown.
I used the carbon footprint calculators in www.climatecrisis.net (18.1 tones per year) and www.nature.org (29 tones per year). Considering that the former tool does did not inquire about my recycling habits, I adopted a another tool from www.carbonfootprint.com/calculator.aspx
About www.climatecrisis.net
This website inquired about the following:
1. State of residence
2. Number of people in household
3. Car (year, make, model)
4. Mileage per year
5. Plane flights per year
6. Average monthly electric bill
7. Percentage of electricity that comes from clean source (solar or wind power)
8. Average monthly natural gas bill
9. Average monthly heating oil bill
10. Average monthly propane bill
This site explained their method for calculating the carbon footprint. Basically, the carbon dioxide footprint is the total of the estimates above, resulting in an approximation of the carbon dioxide that is produced by the combination of transportation and home energy. Then this finding is compared against an estimated monthly per capita U.S. average (roughly 32% of per capita emissions) of 1,250 pounds.
About www.nature.org
This calculator is more specific than the previous tool. Not only does it ask rudimentary questions like state of residence and number of people per household, it also inquires about:
- Home Energy Category: [measures I have taken to change my impact] heating and cooling efficiency, lighting efficiency, use of ENERGY STAR appliances and unplugging electronics not in use, efficiency of heating water. These questions are answered with an “often, sometimes, rarely” fashion.
- It also inquires about the following habits: Driving and Flying; Recycling and Waste; Food and Diet.
This tool calculated my carbon footprint as 29 tones per year. In order to understand how recycling affected my reading, I recalculated my footprint on the premise that I never recycle my new estimate. The new estimate increased to 30 tones of CO2 a year, not a significant increase. The majority of my emissions come from my extensive flights.
To calculate emission values per person, this site used 2004 statistics that said that the U.S. emitted 7074 million metric tones of carbon dioxide, averaging to about 27 tones per person. In this calculation, direct emission (home energy, personal transportation, diet, waste,) make up 45% of the 7074 total. “For the specific behaviors evaluated in the calculator, we rely on data regarding typical consumption to determine an average contribution. In most cases, we also calculate high and low endpoints for each behavior. These three points are used to frame the specific responses for each behavior.” To determine the indirect emissions for each user, we apply an indirect emissions factor to all personal behaviors. This is simply the ratio of total U.S. CO2 emissions to the total emissions for the personal behaviors we are considering. For example, direct emissions from one long flight is approximately 1 ton and indirect emissions add 1.2 tons, for total emissions of 2.2 tons.”
In the case of recycling, the site explains that in 2004, and average of 246 million tones of short waste were landfilled in 2004. This equates to 2.1 tones of CO2 equivalent greenhouse gases per capita. Using this information, the site can calculate how this emission factor can be reduced if a person recycles (by 42%) and composts (by 24%) his household trash his emissions.
According to this tool, recycling and composting are indirect behaviors that have a minor effect one’s carbon emissions.
About www.carbonfootprint.com
This tool is perhaps the comprehensive of the three because its questions are divided into 6 categories: House, Flights, Car, Motorbike, Bus and Rail, and Secondary. New assessment categories the other tools lacked are motorcycle, public transportation, options about one’s fashion and electronic purchases, and the packaging on purchased items. My carbon footprint is 20.286 if “most of my waste is recycled” and 24.169 tones per year if “I don’t recycle at all.” Interestingly, recycling can significantly affect the outcome or your calculation. If I didn’t recycle then the majority of my emissions, 9.609 tones/year would stem from secondary activities. But because I do recycle, my secondary activities only account for an average of 5.726 tones/year. The Secondary activities which I am referring to are:
-Food Preferences
-Organic Produce
-In Season Foods
-Imported Foods or Goods
-Fashion
-Packaging
-Furniture and Electricals
-Recycling
-Recreation
I decided to also calculate my carbon footprint as a college student who uses the Metro to move around the city, lives in a dormitory, and for the most part, can control the air conditioning and heating in the room. In this reading I’m emitting 12.312 tones per year. I believe this reading to be fairly accurate because without my family’s ridiculously high monthly electricity expenditure and my driving habits it is natural for my emissions to drop significantly.
Sources:
http://www.climatecrisis.net/takeaction/carboncalculator/#
http://www.nature.org/initiatives/climatechange/calculator/
http://www.carbonfootprint.com/calculator.aspx
1 comment:
very nice research and analysis
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