Carbon Footprint Comparison

 
     Hey everybody! So this week we had to compare our carbon footprint with that of a household of our choice! Naturally the battle of the sexes began between my girlfriend, her 2 female room mates, and my 4 male room mates and myself. I used a carbon footprint calculator located at http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/ind-calculator.html#c=theBasics&p=reduceOnTheRoad&m=calc_currentEmissions to judge the competition. At the end of the month when we received our Consumers Energy bills, and with the help of the carbon footprint calculator, my house was victorious! Despite having 2 more humans in the house, the fact that we recycle everything gave us the edge. It really irks me to see my girlfriend and her room mates throwing away milk jugs, egg cartons, newspapers, and the like, when Kalamazoo is so adamant about its recycling program.

      Our carbon footprint came in at 19,039 lbs of CO2 per year, while the challengers came in at 25,269 lbs of CO2 per year. Both of these were well below the suggested average of the calculator, at a whopping 100,000 lbs per year with a household of 5. This data seems quite perplexing to me due to the fact that both of our houses do little to be green oriented. However I intend to do more research on the national average CO2 emissions per year. 'Till then, life's a garden, dig it.



http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/ind-calculator.html#c=theBasics&p=reduceOnTheRoad&m=calc_currentEmissions