Ecological Footprint

 

Reduce Your Ecological Footprint | Climate Protection | RESET.org

 

MY FOOTPRINT: 

  • 7.45 hectares. 

Comparison of Footprint:

Sinu – 8.35 hectares
Draedon – 6.8 hectares
Lucas – 7.9 hectares
Glen – 15.2 hectares
Ronan – 8.65 hectares
Ben H. – 7.9 hectares
Bana – 8.7 hectares
Dylan – 12.45 hectares
Colin – 12.25 hectares 

Actions that currently increase my footprint: 

  1. I currently am buying a lot of new clothes for back to school and since I recently had a gigantic growth spurt. 
  1. I like to flush the toilet a lot even if I don’t pee too much. 
  1. I take medium length showers, but I can probably (and should) take even shorter ones. 
  1. Our family and I use a fair bit of single use plastics which increases our daily garbage haul. 
  1. Our family currently owns 2 cars, and I am using one to commute to and back from school. 
  1. I spend tons of time on my electronic devices watching videos, playing games, doing homework, etc. 
  1. My diet consists of me consuming a lot of meat which isn’t usually organically raised, plus some processed foods which creates more waste and has a negative impact on the environment. 
  1. I do have a small garden at home but it doesn’t yield enough food, so we depend on grocery shopping and such, some of the goods bought not being local (but most are) and not being organic. 
  1. We don’t wash our cars too often, but the garden requires a bunch of water and tending too. 
  1. I eat/consume a lot of dairy, mostly milk and cheese. 

5 of the things I chose to reduce and Why: 

  1. Cars and reducing the amount spent commuting  

I want to reduce the amount of time spent commuting inside a car because first, our family doesn’t own any electric/hybrid cars so driving around every day to school and back and some other small trips might be a bit hard on the environment with all the co2 emissions. My dad has to drive me to school every day, which can also be a bit hard on him as well. 

  1. Electronics and reducing screen time 

I spend quite few of my time each day in front of a computer which isn’t too good for my eyes and my well-being. Homework itself I know is mandatory but some of that time is spent playing games and just watching videos which aren’t necessary and can be cut down. For my own sake I am trying to cut down my screen-time. Maybe be more efficient with doing my schoolwork to further scale down my screen-time. 

  1. Eating less meat. 

I chose to cut down on my meat intake because most of the meat I eat isn’t organic which also damages the environment quite a bit. Processed meat and non-organic meat can also be very unhealthy when consumed in large amounts or just being eaten in general. There are also a lot of healthy meat alternatives that I can easily try out. I also decided that cutting down on dairy wouldn’t be the best solution since of all the things that require dairy and it doesn’t have that big of an influence on the environment compared to meat. 

  1. Buying less clothes – 

I’m cutting down on the amount of clothes I’m getting since I believe I have already gotten enough clothes to sustain me for a while, but also because I do have an older brother in which I can rummage through his wardrobe to “borrow” anything that I like/need (with his consent of course). Cutting down on the amount of clothes bought would stop some environmental damage caused by manufacturing and stop more clothes from getting thrown in landfills.  

  1. Taking shorter showers – 

Reducing my time spent in the shower would not only give me more time do more productive stuff but it would improve my hygiene since instead of lazing around inside my shower I would have to spend that time cleaning myself more thoroughly. Reducing water usage and waste is pretty cool too. 

 

How I will be changing these things: 

  1. By Bussing. 

Instead of commuting to and from school using our family’s personal car, on the half days I will be walking to a nearby bus stop and commuting back home using transit. This will happen on the half days of school (for me it’s Monday, Wednesday, and Tuesday.) Sometimes if it’s heavy rain/bad weather or if I don’t have the opportunity to bus home, I’ll get picked up 

  1. By limiting my overall screen time. 

Reducing the amount of time on my devices be it texting, playing games, or watching non-educational videos. I will be recording my time spent on devices not used for homework or mandatory stuff each day starting September 30th I will be trying to lessen the average screen-time each day. Though time may severely vary if I’m busy/not busy with homework and extracurriculars. Going for an average of 2 hours each day. 

  1. Recording what I eat and limiting the amount of daily meat intake. 

I will record what meat I eat each day for all meals on each day for the next 2 weeks starting October 3rd (since I forgot to start recording earlier rip.) Recording my daily intake will help with controlling and reducing my overall intake. I will be attempting to lessen my meat intake and trying different alternatives. Just eating less meat in general and cutting down on available options, focusing on vegetables and other foods. 

  1. By buying less clothes and being content with what I have. 

This one is probably the easiest of the bunch. Try not to buy any clothes unless it’s completely mandatory. If I do end up buying one, I’ll donate something old out of my closet to compensate. I’ll record any clothing I managed to purchase over my recording period. 

  1. Have a reminder/clock/timer when I shower. 

I will record the length of each shower I’ll take starting from September 30th and I will compare the average time to my old showering length. I think recording the amount of time I spend in the shower and setting a goal will help severely decrease my water usage using the shower. I will be trying to lessen my average time spent in the shower each day from 6-7 minutes down to around 4-5. 

RECORDING (Sorry you can’t see my tables, formatting is weird): 

  1. Bussing 
Sept.30  Oct.1  Oct.2  Oct.3  Oct.4  Oct.5  Oct.6  Oct.7  Oct.8  Oct.9 
Bus  Bus  (Full Day)  N/A  N/A  Bus  (Full Day)  Driven Home  Bus  N/A (Full Day) 
Oct. 10  Oct. 11  Oct. 12  Oct. 13  Oct. 14           
N/A  N/A  N/A  N/A (Full Day)  N/A (day assignment was due)           

 

 

  1. Screen Time (minus homework): 
Sept.30  Oct.1  Oct.2  Oct.3  Oct.4  Oct.5  Oct.6  Oct.7  Oct.8  Oct.9 
15 min  45 min  1H  1H 45M  35 min  30 min  2 hours 14 min  3 hours  1 hour 45 min  30 min 
Oct. 10  Oct. 11  Oct. 12  Oct. 13  Oct. 14           
4.5 hours  2 hours, 10 minutes  4 hours, 20 minutes  30 min  N/A (day was due)           

 

 

  1. Daily Meat Intake: 
Oct.3  Oct.4  Oct.5  Oct.6  Oct.7  Oct.8  Oct.9  Oct.10  Oct.11  Oct.12 
2 Beef Burgers
1/3 Whole Salmon 
Bit of pork in egg rolls (had around 6) Spring roll size  Bit of pork in noodles (not too much) More of a topping  N/A  1 Tiny Hot Dog 

 

Spicy sausage fried rice. (Cut into very small pieces, not too much) 

Hot Dog (1 sausage) fairly small  Beef Chili Fries (Was reaaallly good) 

An acceptable amount of ground beef 

 

N/A  A HECK TON OF TURKEY (THANKSGIVVVVIINNNGGG) 

Maybe 1/7th of the entire turkey (was hungry) 

Thanksgiving dinner #2, Similar to previous dinner but ate way less dinner and focused on non-meat. 
Oct. 13  Oct 14.                 
A little bit of Turkey in Kung Pao Turkey (kung pao chicken but with turkey instead)  N/A 

(Day Assignment was Due.) 

               

 

 

  1. Clothes 

(NO CLOTHING ITEMS BOUGHT DURING THIS TIME) 

 

 

  1. Showering: 
Sept.30  Oct.1  Oct.2  Oct.3  Oct.4  Oct.5  Oct.6  Oct.7  Oct.8  Oct.9 
11 miin  9 min 20 sec  5M  N/A  4 min  8 min 10 sec  4 min 10 sec  5 min  4.5min  6 min 30 sec 
Oct. 10  Oct. 11  Oct. 12  Oct. 13  Oct. 14           
4.5 min  N/A  5 min 25 sec  4 min 40 sec  N/A 

(Day assignment was due) 

         

 

 

REFLECTION: 

Changes that were easy to make: 

  • Cutting my shower time down even smaller was a tough change to make on paper but once I started, not wasting any time in the shower didn’t seem that big of a challenge. So, I had the ability to cut down shower time fairly easily. Having each of my showers timed also really helped motivate me to get a good time, if that’s how you put it. 
  • I was really open to trying other foods besides meat. Even though I probably can’t live without consuming a bit of the non-vegetarian stuff, I thought that eating less meat on average wasn’t that big of a challenge to do and could be considered easy. However, if I’m not recording my daily meat intake I might go back to eating more meat. 
  • Buying less clothes was also a pretty niche footprint to cut down on so it wasn’t hard at all to “not buy” any new clothing or accessories. 
  • Bussing was hard figuring out all the routes back home and such though after I got the hang of it became pretty easy I would say. 

Changes that were difficult to make: 

  • Reducing my screen-time for non-mandatory uses. I like to play video games and its sort of a decently big side hobby. Trying to cut down on screen time in general was just fairly hard, especially on the weekends with little to do and a lot of my friends also being online so we could play together. Very tempting to also just binge different TV. Shows and watch a bit of YouTube but I held back on that. 
  • Learning the routes for bussing and everything for the first time was fairly tricky, since my bus route is complicated and requires getting on and off quite a bit to get home.  
  • I would say just in general getting in the routine of slowly changing your ecological footprint habits and reducing each of said footprints at the start was surely a difficult task but was slowly manageable.  

Obstacles I’ve met trying to reduce my ecological footprint: 

  • I forgot to record the first few days of my meat intake (started Oct.3 instead of September 30th). 
  • Resisting the urges to play video games (which I partly succeeded in completing) 
  • Thanksgiving dinner was a big obstacle in terms of cutting down my meat intake. 

Plans I will take in the future 

  • In the future I will take precautions to continue to reduce my ecological footprint casually through previous plans listed above, however I will not follow them as religiously as I did for this assignment. Since to be completely honest, I probably do not have the time for. 
  • Plans I will take are to continue to take shorter showers, cut down on meat when I have the chance too, really try to cut down on screen time, continue to bus home, and buy the least amount. 

 

 

 

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