You might not be too big, but your environmental impact might not be as small. It’s becoming hip to measure your resource consumption as your “ecological footprint”. Wikipedia claims, “Ecological footprint (EF) analysis attempts to measure human demand on nature. It compares human consumption of natural resources with planet Earth’s ecological capacity to regenerate them. It is an estimate of the amount of biologically productive land and sea area needed to regenerate (if possible) the resources a human population consumes and to absorb and render harmless the corresponding waste, given prevailing technology and current understanding. Using this assessment, it is possible to estimate how many planet Earths it would take to support humanity if everybody lived a given lifestyle.”
Take this quiz to determine your footprint. And then, of course, you’re a caring individual, and you want to reduce it. So….
- Sign up to a green energy supplier (an supplier that generates power from renewable sources)
- Clean or replace filters on your furnace and air conditioner
- Use Blackle when searching the internet (my fave!)
- Avoid phantom/vampire energy use
Visit Dumb Little Man to check out the rest of the ideas. (Photo)
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