10 Easy Ways To Reduce Your Carbon Footprint
March 21, 2007 · Written by Joel
Your “carbon footprint” is a fancy name for measuring how much carbon dioxide you, er, produce. Whether or not you believe carbon dioxide is the cause of global warming or not, it is harmful to the environment and reducing your carbon footprint is a great idea.
Step 1: How Big Is Your Carbon Footprint?
Before you can reduce it, you need to know how big it is. The average person in the UK causes the emission of 13,000kg of carbon dioxide equivalent gases per year. The global average is 5,800kg, in India it’s around 1,300kg. There are various ways of measuring your carbon footprint. Usually they’re made up of a series of scores, such as Transport score, Energy score, Food score, and Waste score. Try this carbon footprint calculator, or this one, this one, or finally this one.
Step 2: Reduce Your Carbon Footprint
- Turn down your thermostat. Turning your thermostat down by one degree centigrade could save a typical home £49 a year.
- Close and/or line your curtains to keep in warmth. Setting your heating to turn off one hour before you leave the house and come on half an hour before you get home could save you £51 a year.
- Turn off lights. Switching off four unnecessary lightbulbs and you could save £32 a year.
- Turn off standby. Leaving your TV and all accessories attached to it on standby all the time could cost you £46 a year.
- Turn down and use the half load setting on washing machines and tumble dryers. Washing laundry at 40 to 60 degrees centigrade in your washing machine could save you £12 a year.
- Don’t boil more water in the kettle than you need to. If you always boil the amount of water needed for one cup rather than boiling a full kettle, you could save £30 a year.
- Fix leaks as these are not only wasting water but also energy if they’re from a hot water source.
- Use energy saving lightbulbs to save even more money and energy.
- Recycle more!
- Fly less. Train travel is up to 10 x more energy efficient than plane travel. Of course, not travelling at all is even more effective…
Step 3: Save Money and Feel Smug
Other ideas welcome. If you want some other great suggestions, try our free 100 quick and easy ways to save the planet. If you have less time, try our top 10 tips to reduce your carbon footprint.
Sources: The Independent and Daily Telegraph
Re point 10, for all you budding (European) skiers, I highly recommend Eurostar’s Ski Train service - direct to the French Alps from London in 7hrs and very green compared to flying, and actually a bit quicker than a flight and a transfer. Plus there are two cafe bars serving fine continental beers, meaning the 7hr journey quickly flys by - as I found out last week!
And they recycle the blankets they give you on the ski train you know - they go to dog’s homes and homeless charities. Supposedly using the train is 10 times more environmentally friendly than going by plane!
If anyone sends gifts to Australia (from the UK) or to the UK (from Australia) I have found a fantastic website http://www.pegog.com which allows you to purchase gifts in the country the item needs to be sent and they also gift wrap the gifts. It not only reduces your carbon footprint as gifts aren’t sent by air but it also saves you money cutting out the international postage costs. I’ve used it for my mums birthday and intend to use it for all my christmas gifts this year. It’s only a small thing but everything we do makes a difference!
Great find Daz, thanks for letting us know. It’s getting more and more commonplace to order gifts in the country of destination, rather than posting it over. It’s a practice I know mail companies are geting concerned about!
I struggle with a passion for traveling and compassion for the environment. I would be happy to start using trains more instead of planes. Unfortunately, the cost is prohibitive. How do we go about reducing train costs to be comparable with flights such that trains are more attractive? Does anyone know of inexpensive ways of traveling by train, particularly within the UK and from the UK to the rest of Europe?
Hi Cat,
I find trains massively inexpensive. Simply booking through http://www.thetrainline.com with 3 months, a 300 mile journey can cost less than £15. They also have a worldwide site now - http://www.internationaltrainline.com/. Hope that helps!
Cat - try here: http://www.megatrain.com/uk/timetables/index_megatrain.php - it doesn’t go everywhere but it might help.
Hello,
Suggestion #1 is a great idea,and you eluded to this in suggestion #2 — You can buy a programmable Thermostat which can help you save money when you are at work! How great is that? I love it. I would recommend that you turn your thermostat up or down about 5 degrees when at work - think how much money that will save and it will help reduce your carbon footprint at the same time.
Commonwealth Heating and Cooling, Norfolk, VA
http://www.cwheatcool.com
Hi Jessica. I have one of these and actually turn it off when I’m at work so it’s not using any energy at all - it’s great.
[...] Green Where To Start - 3 Simple Steps To Going Green 100 Ways To Save The Planet 10 Easy Ways To Reduce Your Carbon Footprint 5 Simple Ways Your Business Can Go Green Time To Switch Off Green Interviews The Green Glossary [...]
[...] Green Where To Start - 3 Simple Steps To Going Green 100 Ways To Save The Planet 10 Easy Ways To Reduce Your Carbon Footprint 5 Simple Ways Your Business Can Go Green Time To Switch Off Green Interviews The Green Glossary [...]
[...] Green Where To Start - 3 Simple Steps To Going Green 100 Ways To Save The Planet 10 Easy Ways To Reduce Your Carbon Footprint 5 Simple Ways Your Business Can Go Green Time To Switch Off Green Interviews The Green Glossary [...]
I have also heard of painting a room with bright colors as they reflect more light. This would require you to use less light.
I think the best way is to buy Carbon Credits to offset our lifestyles. I can’t agree with you more start using less energy. Check out my site you can buy carbon credits for almost everything.
http://www.mycarbontracker.com/
Thanks Jon. I knid of see carbon credits as a last resort, in a way like recycling. It’s better not to use it in the first place, but if you HAVE to then it’s not a bad idea.
This is so interesting. My daughter had just told me about this term today. She learned it in her environmental studies class and I found it fascinating. She’s the one who is enlightening me and helping me to go green.
Great, thanks Elizabeth! I just read an article today about the over 70’s being into being green so perhaps the old and young can teach the “middle”?
when you fly, make sure you use a transfer service as you can share with 8 people rather than hire a car for smaller groups. Every little helps