What's your ecological footprint?

[cloudwalking]

http://www.footprint-wwf.be/footprintpage.aspx?projectId=69&languageId=2

answer the questions honestly and then post your results here.

my (and jarosh's too i guess) result:



we're pretty eco-friendly: don't have a car, walk pretty much everywhere and take the bus/train sometimes, work nearby, apartment is well insulated and stays warm without cranking the heat, don't eat a lot of prepackaged stuff and buy organic, don't eat much meat.

we could improve things by making more of an effort to recycle, and to cut down on energy consumption.

[drozmight]

2.0 Hectares.


I'm well below the American average.
I'm almost African.

[Tieno]

3.9 ha.
-My mom and stepdad moved to South-Africa so I have a relatively big house to myself, but really well insulated and use heating (gas) very economically.
-Just learned how to drive but I used to use public transport and my bike all the time.
-Regarding food, depends. I'm a bit too lazy sometimes to go for fresh stuff, but I should do it more.
-Paper, I recycle paper but get lots of junk mail. Cancelled all the subscriptions (we changed to an online subscription of our newspaper)
-Wish there'd be more on recycling because almost 95% of our trash here gets recyled. General trash, PMD (plastics, metal and drink packaging), paper and greens.

[Tauntaun]

2.6

Where's the asian average, racialists?

Asians aren't people. 

[drozmight]

I don't have a car... eat meat 3-4 times a week... I eat out lot, but only use recycled paper and don't get any junk mail.  My apt's kinda small and the apartment manager put these really well insulated windows in that keep the place really reall REALLY warm just on oil heat alone.

[Tieno]

South Africa is the new Spain for above average income Europeans. My folks have friends who live there, their dog barks at black people and they live in a fenced community.

My folks will prob move to Spain though, they don't like living fenced in. I doubt they will leave me a house to live in though  :'(

  Tieno's

spoiler (click to show/hide)

Apartheid

[close]

Loving Folks who leave him a house  

My mom worked real hard to 'build' this house and had it tough to keep after the divorce (she was a teacher). Now with S-A she didn't want to sell for emotional reasons and also to have a fallback if things go bad in S-A. Step dad getting fired a year and a half ago was the best thing to happen to them!
They moved to George and they don't live in gated community. It's a 'wealthy' (European) neigbourhood at the edge of the city.

[Tieno]

Based on when I'm at home:

- 7 people live in my home including me.

- I eat: mainly fresh food but also tinned and frozen.

- I eat meat everyday, a portion more than 200g (for the whole day).

- I live in a large detached house.

- My home is well insulated but I never use the heating system. (we're getting cooked as is)

- Heat works by elect.

- I (and others in my home) use electrical appliances wastefully. ಠ_ಠ

- I use only recycled papers, I don't receive junk mail or have many subscriptions.

- I use a car everyday between 50k and 100k on average.

- I almost never use public transport (I would if there were any decent ones).

- Usually on holidays I'm within 1000k by a car.

3.9 ha or 39,000 square meters.
Not much of an eco-bastard like I thought I was gonna be, I thought I'd get a higher result.
I wonder what makes all those Euros and Americans' higher, what answers would they choose differently.

3.9 ha.

Let's move in together.

You already live with 7 people!

Yesterday there was a news item here how a couple who heat their new house via electricity, electric accumulators, (They feel safer) got a 16 000euro fine for it. Yes, sixteen thousand euros.

Heating via electricity is very ecologically unfriendly cause so much energy goes to waste. First with the generation of electricity at the plant and then in the house.

[Great Rumbler]

3.1 hectares for me.

[DJ_Tet]

3.1


I do a lot of stuff in the last couple of years trying to live cleaner (and cheaper.)

I didn't get the recommendation to cooking with lids on your pots, is that because of escaping heat adding to cooking time?



Some of the tips I do:

Cut my PC/monitor off when I'm not at home.

Put my tv/stereo/videogames on a surge protector and I turn the surge protector off every time I'm not using my entertainment center.  My plasma uses power all the time, like many videogame systems and other tvs, so I just 'unplug' them by hitting the surge protector every time I sleep/leave the house.

I use two glasses when I brush my teeth, one filled with water to wet/rinse my toothbrush and one filled with water to rinse my mouth.  The only time I run the faucet is to rinse the toothbrush for the final time, or to wash my hands/face.

I filter water, and feed my cat left-over filtered water from the night before (he likes it room temp.)  I try not to waste any water (live in a draught area.)  So for showers I get wet, turn off the water, lather up my hair, rinse, turn off the water, lather up body, and rinse again.  None of this running water down the drain for 5+ minutes.

I drive about 15 miles a day (not possible for everyone obviously) and I do it in a civic that I can get nearly 40 mpg (non-hybrid.)

I also use rechargeable batteries and don't leave things plugged in that I'm not using (i/e leaving the phone charger always plugged in or a toaster you use once a month.)

I recycle all my newspapers (get one every sunday for the coupons,) magazines, junk mail, cardboard, glass, and cans.  I also recycle all the material at work that I touch that I can (bubble wrap, camera manuals.)



Hopefully others will share some good green tips.  I agree that the test wasn't as accurate as it could be, but the point is to just wake people up from their sleepwalking daily schedule.  There are steps that everyone can take to decrease their personal output.  


One thing that kind of gets me down sometimes though is thinking about how some corporations waste more water in a day than I save in a year, but you can only control what you can control.

[Brehvolution]

2.1 Hectares which is surprising for a family of 5.
The way the leaf deteriorated in the back round made me think it was much higher.

[Tieno]

2.1 Hectares which is surprising for a family of 5.
The way the leaf deteriorated in the back round made me think it was much higher.

The more people you live with, the more you share in energy (heating, cooking, etc). I think this is your 'personal' footprint, not per house, right?

[Brehvolution]

Ah, so it's my own personal footprint.

[tiesto]

6.1 hectares - my commute is long as hell. Surprised that there isn't any questions about water conservation - I am pretty wasteful with water.

[DJ_Tet]

6.1 hectares - my commute is long as hell. Surprised that there isn't any questions about water conservation - I am pretty wasteful with water.

How?

I said I had 9 people living in my house, waste electricity and east a shit load of meat everyday.

You need 1 person in a large house, not 9.


edit:  Got 14.2 

[Tieno]

Btw, this thins is bullshit. I purposely put the worst answer in every question and only got 4.2, while the "average" American requires 9?

 

Please

I get 14.6ha.
It's your personal footprint, so the less people you share your house with, the worse it is. Also electricity for heating is bad.

[dammitmattt]

5.6

And I won't lose sleep over it.

[Beardo]

I'm too busy deforesting my backyard while turning on my hummer just in case i need to run across the street to grab a pack of gum later

[Eric P]

i got a 4.2  i think most of that's from living in Manhattan

edit: i based it on my va lifestyle and it went to a 6.0

[Tauntaun]

You know what they say about people with huge ecological footprints right? 

[DJ_Tet]

i got a 4.2  i think most of that's from living in Manhattan

Why would living in NYC increase your footprint on this particular test?  Seems like you would save a lot merely from public transportation alone?

[muckhole]

3.8. I expected it to be worse, especially living in the country where you you have to drive everywhere. I'm just not the destroyer of worlds that I thought I was.

[Rman]

3.4.

I never drive since I live in NYC.  That helped make my footprint smaller.

[Eric P]

i got a 4.2  i think most of that's from living in Manhattan

Why would living in NYC increase your footprint on this particular test?  Seems like you would save a lot merely from public transportation alone?

it was far smaller than i expected because i eat proccessed foods more than organic and so on and so forth

[DJ_Tet]

it was far smaller than i expected because i eat proccessed foods more than organic and so on and so forth

Ahh I see.  Yeah people underestimate exactly how much damage is done with every car ride.  In smaller cities without well-developed mass transit I anticipate this will be a big problem sooner rather than later.

[ToxicAdam]

6.7


I was disappointed that I didn't get docked for owning 2 SUV's and for burning leaves/trash.

[muckhole]

Jesus, what are you made of? Hemp?

[DJ_Tet]

Jesus, what are you made of? Hemp?

He's obviously african.

[demi]

1.7

everyone owned?  seems so.

1.6

[Olivia Wilde Homo]

1.2 hectares

I rarely drive (always use public transport), get little mail, buy local, and don't travel anywhere for vacations.

[G The Resurrected]

wow 2.5 thats crazy considering my size and mass pull so much on the earth that our axis is slowing down 1 second every thousand years.

[demi]

No wonder you dont get the ladies Demi, chicks like running water and electricity. Get back on the boat to Africa.

Good, I don't like girls

[cool breeze]

2.3

[Bildi]

4.1.

They didn't even ask me about my environmentally friendly manual push mower.

[Tauntaun]

1.2 hectares

I rarely drive (always use public transport), get little mail, buy local, and don't travel anywhere for vacations.

You're the unibomber?

[xnikki118x]

I got 2.4, which surprised me.

Our house is old and badly insulated. We drive cars and don't use public transit. Junk mail comes here a lot. We buy more frozen/canned veggies than fresh ones.

[Beardo]

1.2 hectares

I rarely drive (always use public transport), get little mail, buy local, and don't travel anywhere for vacations.

You're the unibomber?

AHAHAHAHAAAA

[brawndolicious]

2.2 hectares.  It's a very inaccurate test though.

don't eat a lot of prepackaged stuff and buy organic, don't eat much meat.

usually organic foods cost more resources to produce.  pre-packaged foods and meat use up a lot of energy though of course.

[Propagandhim]

*breathes in the smug*

I'm not progressive, I'm broke.

[Bildi]

I got 2.4, which surprised me.

Our house is old and badly insulated. We drive cars and don't use public transit. Junk mail comes here a lot. We buy more frozen/canned veggies than fresh ones.

Hang on, that's me!  But I got 4.1?

I'm doing the test again.

[Robo]

4.7

My food habits are terrible and I drive quite a bit; those seem to be the worst things.

[Olivia Wilde Homo]

1.2 hectares

I rarely drive (always use public transport), get little mail, buy local, and don't travel anywhere for vacations.

You're the unibomber?

Close - dirty poor college student

[ToxicAdam]

I like how the enviromental movement has now gotten into controlling every aspect of our lives through guilt or proposed financial deterrents.

The air you breathe, the food you eat, the way you shit it out.

Everybody wants to rule the world.

[Fresh Prince]

It's pretty much dead now; the environment is going to take second place to the economy.

[The Fake Shemp]

2.4!  Eat that Euro trash!

[xnikki118x]

I got 2.4, which surprised me.

Our house is old and badly insulated. We drive cars and don't use public transit. Junk mail comes here a lot. We buy more frozen/canned veggies than fresh ones.

Hang on, that's me!  But I got 4.1?

I'm doing the test again.

We have a small house and there are 4 of us living in it, so that's probably why. We drive every day but not very far because we live close to where we need to go.

[CrystalGemini]

2.2 hectares or 22,000 square meters.