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 >
Ross Sands Mooresville, NC USA (16)
Hello, my name is Ross Sands. I am from Mooresville, North Carolina USA. My carbon footprint was pretty high compared to everyone else. It was 20,913kgs. It is above average for my area and worldwide. The majority of my carbon footprint came from transportation. That is because I have a schedule that requires a lot of transportation throughout the day. I was surprised about my results; I thought they would be a lot lower. I learned the source of my carbon emissions and because I now know that, I might be able to cut down on it. I can carpool more, and go out less when using a car.
The majority of my carbon footprint was also from my transportation, since I have to drive to work and I also drive a lot of my friends. While it benefits my friends when I drive them, I don't really benefit since I use my own gas and my own car. However, overall, I am helping out the environment because I am making sure that each of my friends isn't driving individually. I don't really know the best way to get around this problem, since I need to drive in order to work, but it definitely helps to know that transportation is the biggest contributor to my footprint.
Ross, It was interesting reading your post on your carbon footprint. My carbon footprint was very similar in number. My transportation was also by far, the highest of all other sections. I believe this is due to frequent traveling and constant traveling day to day. I think it is important that I reduce emissions that I make into the environment.
Transportation was also my biggest contributor to my footprint, as I feel it probably is for most of the more privileged families. I also work, quite frequently, so driving is a pretty common thing for me, and it's about 3 or 4 miles away from my home, so walking or riding my bike isn't the best idea. I feel like it's hard to be more conservative when you thought you were being conservative in the first place, but it's alarming to me that (what I believe to be) the most harmful to the atmosphere is the most commonly used.
I like your idea about carpooling more. I too get most of my emissions from driving a lot.
Hey Ross, our carbon footprints were very different. Transportation was my lowest category because I do not have a car. Home was my highest category because of my "high-maintenance" home life. I think that you can lower that carbon footprint by carpooling with other people, this helps more than you think. It would reduce emissions because it is just adding a little weight to one car instead of using two cars.