Students from around the world calculated their class mean and standard deviations for their footprints and posted them on our world map.
Do you see differences across the globe? If so, why do you think those differences exist?
Did you use the calculator to try to reduce your footprint down to the average from a citizen of another country? What changes would you have to make to lower your footprint in this way? Are you going to try and take some of these actions in your daily life?
Student Footprints >
Overpopulation Affecting Carbon Emissions
A huge problem for humans and the environment is that humans are overpopulating many parts of the Earth. If you look at any carbon emissions prediction charts, all of them show that the carbon emissions are going to skyrocket and this is because the human population is also going to skyrocket. The more humans that there are, the more things that will have to be produced meaning more carbon emissions. I also believe that we humans need to change our lifestyles to use less stuff, but also even if everyone is having smaller emissions, if there are too many people, then it will not help.
The United States of America is the only developed country that has significant population growth, and also, a child born in America will produce 7 times more carbon than a child in China, the country with the highest carbon emissions in the world. Here in the United States, if the government tries to curb the population, than most likely, the people of the country will be in outrage, so solutions will have to be taken gradually. China’s one child per woman policy is one way to approa ch the problem, but is also widely considered a violation of human rights. I for one do not know how people can solve this problem, possibly making one out of five people not being able to reproduce? Comment any ideas that you may have.
Sources:http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/06/busin … .html?_r=0
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/prog … y/climate/