Many years ago, people grew their own food, made their own clothes and built their own houses. Each family or community was pretty much self-sufficient and used only what they needed to live. These days, we get material and consume goods from all over the world. We use resources like metal, paper, air, soil, water and energy (through gas, oil, coal and hydro). We don't always use them up ourselves directly. Sometimes they absorb our wastes (E.g. pollution in rivers, or garbage in a landfill site.)The effect that our consuming has on the natural environment has been called our "ecological footprint" a concept pioneered by Dr. Bill Rees, from the University of British Columbia.
Our ecological footprint refers to the amount of the earth's surface that is needed to produce all the energy and resources that each of us use to live our particular lifestyles and to absorb all the wastes we produce, directly or indirectly. So our ecological footprint is a measure of our resource use and waste production.
This exercise will help you measure how much of the planet Earth's productive surface you individually require to provide for your food, clothing, housing, transportation, etc. Eco footprints can also be done for entire households, schools or even a town or city (just add your individual eco-footprints together.) It will also show what you can do to help reduce your ecological footprint.
How do you compare?
It is interesting to note that, while the average ecological footprint for each person on Earth is 2.8 hectares (about 7 acres), Canadians require about 7.8 hectares each. It is a mathematical fact that there is not enough productive land on Earth to support all people at this level.(Please circle the value that best answers the question asked)
Housing
1.) How many people are in your household? 1 (30) 2 (25) 3 (20) 4 (15) 5 or more (10) 2.) How is your house heated? Natural Gas (30) Electricity (40) Oil (50) Renewable (solar, wind) (0) 3.) How many faucets/toilets do you have in your house? (faucets include taps in your kitchen, bathrooms, laundry room, and outside) less than 3 (5) 3-5 (10) 6-8 (15) 8-10 (20) more than 10 (25) 4.) What type of home do you live in? Apartment/Condominium (20) House (40) Food
1.) Are you a vegetarian? yes (0) no (50) 2.) How many meals do you prepare/eat at home per week? under 10 (25) 10-14 (20) 14-18 (15) more than 18 (10) 3.) When purchasing your food items, does your family try to buy locally produced goods? Yes (25) No (125) Sometimes (50) Rarely (100) Don't know (75) Transportation
1.) How many cars does your household own? 0 (5) 1 (25) 2 (50) 3 (75) More than 3 (100) 2.) How do you get to school/work? Car (50) Public transit (bus, streetcar, subway, train) (25) School Bus (20) Walk (0) Bicycle (0) 3.) How many trips do you make per week on public transit? 0 (50) 1-5 (40) 6-10 (30) 11-15 (20) more than 15 (10) 4.) Where did you go on your last vacation? No vacation (0) within your province (10) outside your province, but within Canada (30) to the United States (40) outside North America (70) 5.) How many weekends in the summer do you go to a cottage, or go camping? 0 (0) 1-3 (10) 4-6 (20) 6-9 (30) more than 9 (40) Purchases
1.) What large purchases (new electronics -- e.g. stereo, TV, VCR, home computer; car; furniture; appliances -- e.g. fridge, stove, etc.) has your household made this year? 0 (0) 1-3 (15) 4-6 (30) more than 6 (45) Waste
1.) Does your household try and reduce the amount of waste generated in the house (e.g. buying food in bulk, refusing junk mail/flyers deposited in your mailbox, using reusable containers for storage, using natural cleaners as opposed to hazardous materials for household cleaning)? Yes (0) No (30) 2.) Does your household compost? Yes (0) No (20) 3.) Does your family recycle newspapers, cardboard, pizza boxes, fine paper, aluminum cans, glass/plastic bottles and other materials? Yes (0) No (20) 4.) How many garbage bags of waste to you leave at the curb each week for pick up? 0 (0) one half-full (5) 1 (10) 2 (20) more than 2 (30) Scoring:
Total your score by adding up the circled values from the above questions: ______. From the information collected here your Personal Ecological Footprint is:Less than 150 .....under 4.0 hectares
150 to 350 ..........between 4.0 ha and 6.0 ha
351 to 550 ..........between 6.0 ha and 7.7 ha (the Canadian average)
551 to 750 ..........between 7.7 ha and 10.0 ha
More than 750 ....over 10.0 hectares
