The strong want to be able to have the popular things/items that are seen all over the internet, muddle the opinion of whether it is actually needed, or do we want it so bad that it feels like we need it? Lots of things are bought because someone wants it, but when something is needed, people noticeably slack on buy that item because it isn't wanted.

I agree with this, that many of the expensive things we buy are not necessities. However, in the world we live in it is a prised thing to have the coolest new thing or the next celebrity item. Along with people having the need to seem cool or fit in. This goes to show that everything we do contributes to climate change even as something as simple as buying the next popular clothing item to fit in because not only does it lead to over consumption but it leads to our judgment about wants vs needs being clouded.

My household will be able to reduce gas usage because my brother has just left for collage so we will have less to cook, heat, and cool.

That will help the environment.

nice, maybe if we all lowered our emissions we could save the planet

@sean1111 I agree with this. Every single person on Earth could do something to reduce their footprint and help stop climate change. However, even if one person does one thing to help climate change that is still helpful because no matter how big the action it still contributes to the overall stopping of climate change.

Being mindful before buying something and not buying unnecessary products.

A lot of the time I have the experience of buying something that I don't really need but feel like it will make me happy. This may be a response to boredom, however a goal I for myself is to find something else to occupy myself with instead of adding to overconsumption and waste. These harmful materialistic behaviors are something I know a lot of teenagers and people in general struggle with, as due to media the solution to every problem seems to be a new product. This wasteful mindset is part of the reason our planet is in such a bad state. An example of this is the floating trash islands in the ocean and the piles of old products and trash in third world countries that are direct results of our consumer driven society. A way to combat this is to think about if you really NEED something before buying it or if it will just collect dust in your home before you throw it out and it pollutes our environment.

I also understand the wanting something but knowing you don't need it. I feel it is a tricky thing to overcome and the best way to deal with this most likely is to try ones hardest to not get that thing. What we need to do is monitor our consumer nature to try and help our planet thrive, even though it may not do much, in the long it will help us.

I very much agree with this statement. I honestly think that people can be able to tell whether they actually need something or not but they still buy stuff anyway. That is what I think is the problem that people need to overcome. They need to learn to be able to just not buy stuff they don't need rather than being able to understand if they need it or not

I agree, but i like the stuff i dont need

I agree with every person because sometimes when I go shopping I buys clothes but at the end I don't even wear them a lot, just for 2-3 times

While I am under average in almost everything I am wildly over in the travel section and should probably cut down on that

Me too, i think that it might be from when i went on trips for fun over summer break. I could cut back on these to reduce my footprint.

I was also wayyyy over the transportation section and that's the only section I really need to improve more on

Me too, i flew way too much this year which really contributes to travel.

My carbon footprint was heavily impacted by my trip to europe and I know my family is going on many more vacations far away what can I do to reduce the impact those trips will have?

you cant so just enjoy your trip away from home and try new things while youre there

I have this same problem. Its very hard to reduce your carbon footprint from air travel as a kid but being mindful about it is already a major step in the right direction.

My carbon footprint was also extremely impacted by my trips. I think the best thing to do is to lower other other stuff like home or foods. I honestly know I'm going to go on more flights. So I'd enjoy the trips and lower using stuff at home that does impact climate change.

my footprint was also affected a lot by trips, so i will try to cut down on big trips

So apparently I got more kgs in home and food, but I don't understand what I should do to bring it down. Any ideas?

I must eat more organic and less processed foods to make less environmental destruction.

chocolate makes me very happy i eat it lots

According to https://concernusa.org/news/world-hunger-facts/ "the world produces enough food to feed all of its 8 billion people, yet 733 million people (1 in 11) go hungry every day. 2.8 billion people around the world (35% of the global population) cannot afford a healthy diet.
That percentage is even higher in low-income countries, where 71.5% of people cannot afford a healthy diet." (as of 2025)
Sustainable eating is great, but almost impossible when you are struggling to just get any food to eat. If you can afford to eat sustainably, by all means do so. But for poorer people, they don't think to eat sustainably, because they don't have the money to do so. Lowering the price of sustainable, environmentally friendly food would be wonderful. So would making it more accessible/advertising it more. Even if people have the money to buy environmentally friendly food, why eat it when there is far cheaper, better tasting fast food like McDonalds? Sustainable food needs to be more mainstream, less costly, and something that is easily available to the general public. Thanks.

Fast-Fashion is one of the biggest influences  of over consumption our society faces today. Websites such as SHEIN started to trend due to their extremely cheap prices, because of this people tend  to overlook reusing & re-purposing because it is “too much work” or they simply believe they aren’t capable of creating something by hand. Instead of encouraging this behavior we should look towards other alternatives such as thrift-stores! Old clothing that no longer fits you can be donated to these organizations or you can use the fabric for a different craft! Any sort of “trash” can be reused and turned into something resourceful.

The craziest part is that some Fast-Fashion isn't even cheep anymore. Our society has started hiking up prices for things that were supposed to be easy and cheep. Now all we are getting is cheaply made clothes for unfair prices. This should be a wake up call for people to start slowing their role on buying the newest fashions from SHEIN, and start going and buying things at goodwill, value village, or just your local thrift store to give old clothes a second life. Doing this doesn't just help our planet, it also saves us the trouble of poorly made clothes breaking and us going to buy a new one, in turn wasting our money.

In my research, I have found that adopting a vegan diet is one way to save on the environmental impact caused by raising farm animals. Now more than ever there is a lot of healthy, balanced ways to consume a plant-based diet. One of these ways I have found was through the recipes Baking Hermann has showed me. Baking Herman is a website founded on principles of sustainability. Baking Hermann spotlights plant-based meals from around the world to show the diverse foods and meals that can be made.

Here is the website

I agree with what you are saying. I think a plant based diet helps reduce your carbon footprint a lot. Since the demand for meat has gotten much higher, farmers have been clearing way more land for there farm animals to live on as well as land to grow food for the animals. Valuable land too, a football field sized chunk of land is cleared every second for agriculture from rain forests. So eating less meat also saves our forests.

I think adopting a vegan diet is a great idea but for some people it is very hard to give up meat. Maybe if regular meat eaters only have meat 4 out of 6 day of the week it would make a big change. This would be way easier than a full vegan or Vega diet but will still have impacts. Another way could be to eat fast food burgers less because 1 burger is equivalent to 3000 gallons of water or 2 mouths showers so this would have a huge impact on water levels as well.

I 100% agree with your statements. I think that creating a plant based diet is healthy, and also it reduces your carbon footprint significantly. Although for meat eaters switching to a all plant based diet will be tough. I think that for meat eaters instead of eating meat all the time they should try and stick with a plant based diet for at least 4 times a week. Also switching to a plant based diet helps with the farmers so much, because raising these animals give a big chunk of their land so it will help them out a lot.

I agree with the idea of adopting a vegan diet will help with the environmental impact of animal agriculture, although I don’t think everyone should just stop eating meat and dairy. I think that people should cut down on their meat eating per week because some people have been eating meat their whole life’s and we can’t just tell them they’re not allowed any more. Although we can teach people more about where it comes from and let them decide whether they want to become vegan.

I agree with the vegan diet meal but it is quite hard for people who always had meat for the longest time will eventually start to adapt to having a little bit of fresh greens to having half of there meal attached to green foods.

I agree that a vegan diet would reduce the amount of carbon and even have a few other positive impacts but there are some negative impacts that should also be considered when having everyone adopt a vegan diet. In the US, in the year 2024 about 876,460 acres of land were used for farming which is a reason why deforestation happens. If more people were to adopt a vegan lifestyle then the demand for animal products would decrease and so would their populations. This would lead to less land needed for overpopulated animals who were mass produced in order to fill the demand for meat and other products. The economy would also suffer in response to this, such as farmers. Some people also require medical needs that wouldn’t work with a vegan diet and would require more supplements. Most people wouldn’t be willing to give up meat as well. Over all it all depends on the person but if more people adopted a vegan diet less carbon would be created. 

Here is the website link to the statistics on farm land:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/196 … ince-2000/

I agree with possibly adopting a vegan diet, but I wonder for people that won't agree with it is there some other alternative to eating meat, like possibly eating impossible burgers or something? I feel like if you search for the right foods, or possibly the right meals that others have created it would at least be less meat consumption than most people already. Wish there was an in-between because a lot of other people won't agree with going to a vegan or vegetarian diet.

While I agree with what is being said it really is hard to just start being a vegan especially if you have grown up eating meat your whole life. I believe that a way to help the people who want to change their eating, but don't want to give up meat, is to find a happy balance between the two. For example eating vegetarian and/or vegan meals 4/7 days a week and eating meat based dishes the other 3. This kind of plan is a good way to start a less carbon filled eating journey in my opinion, but please tell me your thoughts about this.

something that I cant give up is campfires with my friends because they are too much fun and are not really that bad when compared to other things we humans do.

I feel the same way. I still think we should not do it on the regular though.

I agree even the little things count for something bigger

I agree we should limit the amounts of fires but i can't get rid of them fully.

I believe as humans we want more and more things, such as keeping up with the newest trends. It is not necessary because what we already have before buying these new items are usually in good condition.

I agree with you. I think people do want more and more things as new trends or something new comes out. I however don't think this is a bad thing to an extent of us buying things we don't always need or use.

I agree as well as you can easily notice how fast micro-trends go in and out of popularity which causes for great numbers of people to buy products and throw them away a couple years later after being barely used.

Agreed 100%, unfortunately I have also fallen victim to trends/microtrends but I'm trying to improve my want for unnecessary things, especially when the items I have already work well.

i agree, we want a lot of new things

yes

I agree

Yes it is.

yes, all the pollution in the oceans and a lot of the CO2 in the air was caused by us.

I believe it is due to our large carbon and fossil fuel emissions, constantly warming the planet.

It is caused by us. Via big corporations polluting the atmosphere, and the average persons daily life impacts the C02 pollution as well.

yes

The answer is both, but i think its more important to change the way bigger companies operate to sway the public into watching their own emission's.

I agree

thank you evan

I believe that climate change is effected more by large governments and corporations, and because of this, they should hold most of the responsibility to work against climate change. It is unrealistic to expect individual actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions alone.

I think that climate change is more affected by larger companies but our own emissions are still important

Both do have an effect, but larger companies have a bigger affect 100%. They have much more influence and also burn fuels at huge levels resulting to way too much CO2 in the environment.

I think that both parties have an effect. We should definitely stop companies from doing so much emissions, like carbon caps and taxes. But, I don't think it's an excuse to slack off on our emissions because "one person does not make a difference." We can also push companies to produce less via email and letters. If enough people send them they will listen. (Hopefully ?)

I agree, thinking that it is both larger companies and our own emissions, because every persons emissions, add up to about the same a large company.

I agree, I think that we all have a part to play in climate change, but large gas emissions do also have a big effect.

I think climate change is caused more from big companies but i also think it is still important to think about our own impact to and try to reduce it

i think it is the big companies that are causing it, but individuals should be carful

I think that we should reuse plastic containers instead of throwing them out

We need to make more containers that ARE reusable, most plastic will degrade and leak microplastics into whatever it is containing. I think the solution is to make more biodegradable plastic as apposed to reusing.

I personally think that we need to stop making/creating so much single use plastic in our packaging as its what is mainly sitting in our landfills. Plus, with packaging like the kind you are given from taking food home from restaurants, they use harmful products like Styrofoam which is horrible for environment. Therefore is companies can find more environmentally friendly packaging we can help avoid adding to our already existing waste problem.

We should use either containers that are reusable or compostable inside or outside of your dwelling so it can be repurposed either way.

yeah, I think we should prioritize re-using, and try and keep the number of plastic products we buy to a minimum. As well as reducing the amount of kitchen items like cling wrap and things that won't break down somewhat easily.

Absolutely! I think a lot of people tend to just throw away things that could be used multiple times. Throwing things away will have a bad effect on the environment knowing where they go, I don't exactly where everything goes but i can say for sure a lot of plastic ends in the oceans and definitely effects the wildlife in negative ways. And people can do this by reduce the plastic they throw out.

Yes. I fully believe that humans are the main cause of climate change. The reason for this is because most of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is caused by humans. Humans cause CO2 to be released by cutting down trees for various reasons (ex. clearing land for agriculture, paper production), breeding animals for meat consumption, burning fossil fuels (ex. transportation, heating), electricity use, and so much more. I feel that if we were to reduce some of the things we do to contribute to the CO2 in the environment, then the world would head towards a cleaner and safer future.

If you are a student, you may not think that you can do much to help out, but there are many things you can do including eat less meat, take shorter showers, turn off any electrical device when it is not being currently used, take public transportation, walk, or bike whenever possible, and throw your waste in the right bins. I'm not telling you to change your whole lifestyle, but if we all try to reduce even a little bit of the things we do to contribute to climate change, then we can make a huge impact to change the outcome of the future. Try to do whatever is possible for you.

you're right, we are causing far to much CO2 to enter the atmosphere and this needs to stop. while personal action will help there will always someone who doesn't care, which is why big corporations also need to play a role.

I agree as well, we are causing way to much pollution and C02 to enter our and atmosphere. And we need to do something about it. We need to get big groups of people to help the cause, while individual help and still impact it. Bigger groups get attention better than just one person.

I completely agree Humans have single handed raised the ppm of CO2 by almost 125 since 1960

Wants and needs are very tricky.

What catorgie is most harmful to the planet?

While doing my calculations, I noticed that a carnivore diet with four people produces a lot of CO2.

I agree that carnivore diets produces greater amounts of CO2 than a vegetarian or vegan diet. This is due to many things but one of the greatest contributors is the food needed to feed the animals that could have been used to just feed humans. Personally when driving past cow farms it highlights all of the resources needed to create meat.

I put that I wasn't a vegetarian and immediately got an extreme amount of C02 as well. I guess just one thing to help with C02 impacts would be to eat less meat or just eat smaller bits of it.

Corporations are responsible for a large amount of our carbon emissions. I think that large corporations need to find more enviornmental friendy ways to do buisiness. About 80% of the carbon emissions from 2016 to 2022 can be traced back to only 57 companies. These statistics came from this website

100%. As a society we need to advocate more about how much affect corporations have on the climate, as it is easily the biggest problem related to climate change imo.

I agree too, however I think a couple of these companies make a change on how much C02 they produce all the other companies are bound to follow which would help to lesson carbon emissions by a large amount.

some people exaggerate with shopping which is a desire not a necessity, there are many things they don't need but they still spend a lot of money on things harmful to the environment

yess, overconsumption is such a big issue right now. If people didn't impulse buy so much there wouldn't be so many things that they throw away.

Especially with clothing trends that go away after a few months, people overconsume clothes so much. It's so important to actually like what you're buying and not just get stuff because other people have it!

100% it is not a necessity and many people should at least attempt to cut back

I think that overconsumption is a big issue and that we all need to remember what we have, before we purchase more things.

i think buying things in smaller amounts is one of the problems because they more packaging is used and it cost the consumer more.

Wanting something is different then needing something, wanting something is trying to get something that you don't need, needing something is if your old thing doesn't work or you need something to live your life.e

yeah if everyone only get stuff they needed and not everything they wanted, the world would be a much better place.

no i disagree, if we only have things we need then we should all simply live in shacks with food and water instead of huge homes with cars and whatnot, also we should not own ANY pets and all fend for ourselves, so i disagree but i do agree that we should limit our "wants" to an extent

I think we need a balance of needs and wants. Everyone should have a house with running water and electricity, and many families need cars to get to work and school. But when it comes to wants, you should be able to get some small things that you want every now and then, but I don't think you need EVERYTHING you want. Also pets should be for families that can afford to take care of the pet, and are financially stable enough to feed it and take it to the vet whenever needed.

yes i agree, you should get wants instead of ONLY relying on what you need. as for pets, i double agree. it almost seems selfish when homeless people own pets (respectfully) because they are literally in the worst possible situation for the pet. if i was homeless and would continue being homeless for a long time to come, i would give my dog to a shelter or someone trustworthy (i know its harder than it sounds

I would say wants are a major part of your carbon footprint because it is stuff that you don't need. Needs are the necessities like food water and shelter. I think the wants are what separate different peoples carbon footprint though I think there needs to be a balance between the two.

there should be certain website that are recipes for things that are typically leftover ingredients