This Blog Is Carbon Neutral

I never really thought about how little things we take for granted (like being able to write this blog for example), really have an impact on the big picture. I recently started a new job, and it kills me to see the amount of paper that gets wasted on a daily basis. Anything from post-it notes, to junk faxes. I try to reuse as much as I possibly can, but it gets hard sometimes, and it definitely does not look very professional. After thinking about it for a couple days, I have now set my mind on starting some tree seedlings to plant nearby. I know this effort might seem frugal, but I know my conscience will appreciate it, and so will my lungs!

So coincidentally, today when I was reading a blog I follow, there was a "this blog is carbon neutral" button on the side bar. Huh... I thought to myself, what in the world does that mean? I knew that carbon footprints are bad, and I knew that the bigger the carbon footprint, the worse the impact, but I never really understood what it meant. I did a bit of research online about what exactly a carbon footprint is, and this is the simplest definition I came up with;
Carbon Footprint is  the measurement of the greenhouse gases produced by activities of a person, a family, a school, group, event or business that involve burning fossil fuels. So, for example; Importing exotic fruits from Peru has a bigger Carbon Footprint than buying local in season fruits because it has a longer process to go through from point "A" to point "B".

Intrigued by my new found knowledge I began to research different ways to reduce your carbon footprint, and I thought I'd share a list of 10 easy ways to reduce your carbon footprint, just by what you eat. I found this list on myecoproject.org.

Here’ a list of changes you can make to your food choices to reduce your carbon footprint:

• Eat less beef, pork, and lamb: Producing 1 pound of beef uses up 29 times more water than 1 pound of chicken and 50 times more water than 1 pound of soybeans.

• Eat out at restaurants less often: The lighting, cooling, operation of the restaurant, and the energy used to drive there all cost the environment more than cooking that same meal at home.

• Eat fewer dairy products: Together with meat, dairy products are responsible for emissions such as CO2, nitrous oxides and methane — all big factors in global warming.

• Drink fewer soft drinks: 200 billion beverage containers were sold last year — and over 130 billion of those ended up in landfills or incinerators.

• Eat seasonal and local fruits and vegetables: A fruit’s origin can have a significant impact on the environment — the energy used to transport grapes, for example, from Chile to San Francisco is far greater than transporting them from Napa Valley.

• Eat fewer packaged snacks and junk food: One third of the energy used to produce food goes to snacks, candy and soft drinks. And more than half of all plastic packaging is used to package food.

• Upgrade to an energy efficient refrigerator: Your refrigerator is likely the biggest energy sink in your house using up to 5 times as much electricity as your television.

• Eat wild fish that are not endangered: High-tech fishing practices are depleting fish stocks, endangering entire species, and damaging habitats.

• Drink less bottled water: Producing the bottles for US consumption of bottled water for one year requires the equivalent of more than 17 million barrels of oil; Bottling this water produced more than 2.5 million tons of carbon dioxide; It takes 3 liters of water to produce 1 liter of bottled water.

• Walk to your local farmers market or grocery store: The food on the typical American family’s dinner table has traveled an average of 1,500 miles.

If you look to the left of my blog you'll notice, I have a "this blog is carbon neutral" button now too! Click it! you should get one too! It's an organization dedicated to planting one tree for every blog to help reduce emissions. Neat idea eh?

How do you reduce your carbon footprint?

-xo Hippie Girl