Supakorn Pothong Blog

Carbon dioxide (CO₂) helps air absorb heat from the sun. The more CO_2, the greater warming of the earth.            In my opinion, the first step to reduce the quantity of CO₂ in the atmosphere is to reduce your carbon footprint. Your carbon footprint is the sum of all emissions of CO₂, which was induced by your activities in a given time frame. Most of your activities are relating CO₂ emissions. When you drive a car, the engine burns fuel which creates a certain amount of CO₂, depending on its fuel consumption and the driving distance. When you heat your house with oil, gas or coal, then you also generate CO₂. Even if you heat your house with electricity, the generation of the electrical power may also have emitted a certain amount of CO₂. When you buy food and goods, the production of the food and goods also emits some quantities of CO₂ [1].

There are many ways to reduce your carbon footprint. Lisa Wise, an executive director of the Center for a New American Dream, gave us 15 ways of everyday choices and actions you can do to reduce your carbon footprint [2]:

1. Buy organic and local.
2. Pay attention to packaging:

• Try to go to stores or co-ops that keep packaging minimum,
• Take reusable bags to the grocery store.

3. Ditch bottled water:

• Try buying a reusable water bottle or canteen for your water.

4.Energy-proof your home:

• Make sure all of your windows close properly,
• Keep your heating and cooling systems properly maintained,
• Switching from incandescent to compact florescent light.

5. Go native:

• Use native plant species to landscape around your home or business.

6. Try window shopping or browsing first:

• Ensure you are only buying things you really need.

7. Take a direct flight.
8. Switch water heaters to vacation mode.
9. Unplug it:

• Try using a power strip for groups of electronic items, one flick of the switch and it’s all off.

10.  Keep your car:

• Keep your car in good running condition,
• Try more eco-friendly modes of transport when possible, like buses, trains, a bicycle, telecommuting or even walking.

11.  Chuck your microwave:

• A freezer full of meals is actually more energy-intensive — it costs more to freeze foods, ship them cold, display them frozen in the grocery store and keep them frozen in our homes.

12.  Use cold water (for laundry).

13.  Have the family over:

• Cooking and entertaining for larger groups is more efficient and, per person, a lot less expensive.

14.  Make time for errand:

• Try bundling errands together to reduce how far you need to travel.

15.  The Three Rs: Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.

The link below is the video that will show you some more tips to reduce your carbon footprint:

http://youtu.be/HJwt9nwCElA

References:

1. http://timeforchange.org/what-is-a-carbon-footprint-definition
2. http://sustainability.publicradio.org/consumed/tips.html

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 25th, 2011 at 10:01 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.