Simple Swaps to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint
Your carbon footprint is simply the amount of carbon you produce in a single day. If we all reduces our personal footprints over time, this would have far bigger effect than what governments are doing (i.e nothing).
How to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint is a fun book packed with tips to heat or cool your house, manage electronic devices, cook smarter, garden with nature, shop local, travel sustainably and change financial habits.
Before cooking, read up on food safety for people and pets. If growing food, read our posts on no-dig gardening. Avoid facing indoor foliage to outdoor gardens, to help stop birds flying into windows.
Ellen Tout is an eco living editor who has worked with Friends of the Earth, and is also a coastal guardian with Kent Wildlife Trust. A vegan who is passionate about reducing food waste, she lives in Kent.
Easy Ways to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint
A carbon footprint is the total greenhouse gases from the things you do. Burning fuel in your car, the energy needed to light your home, and even what’s on your dinner plate all add to it.
- Switch to LED bulbs. They use far less energy and last longer.
- Unplug devices. Appliances on standby waste power day and night.
- Walk or cycle for short trips. Good for your health and budget too.
- Use public transport where possible. Trains and buses share journeys with others.
- Eat less red meat and dairy. Livestock rearing creates lots of greenhouse gases.
- Cut food waste. Plan meals and use leftovers.
- Choose local and seasonal produce. Cuts down on transport emissions.
- Recycle paper, glass, plastics, and cans properly.
- Avoid single-use items. Reusable water bottles, bags, and coffee cups.
- Fix and repair things, instead of binning them.
Free Carbon Calculators
The Farm Carbon Calculator is a free carbon calculator toolkit, and takes 30 minutes to 2 hours to give a lens into how you can save carbon. Developed by an organic vegetable farmer in the Scilly Isles, it can be used by farms of any scale or soil type or place in the UK.
Mukti Mitchell is an eco expert (son of ecological writer Satish Kumar) who once built a solar-powered boat, and sailed it around the British Isles, to show it could be done.
He has produced a wonderful free carbon calculator. Make yourself a cuppa, and sit down with a good notepad and pen. The 5 minute quiz can reduce your energy bills. Or take the full 45 minute version to drastically reduce your energy and bills (and of course, carbon!)
It’s very detailed, so find your bills as you’ll be asked about your tariff, type of energy used, how many in your household etc. You’ll also be asked about your travel and eating habits, as this is a calculator for all your carbon use, not just energy.
Once finished, just save your results, then go back now and then, to see how your carbon is reducing, and in turn, your bills.
Calculate the Carbon Footprint of Everything
The Carbon Footprint of Everything is an expert and entertaining guide by a carbon expert. Supported by solid research, just look up anything to find easy-to-follow charts and graphs.
From drying your hands to carrier bags and from boiling water to buying newspapers, this makes learning how to reduce your carbon footprint fun! Contents include the carbon footprint of:
- Having a child
- Ironing a shirt
- A glass of beer
- Getting cremated
- The World Cup
- Volcanic eruptions
- The Iraq war
Mike Berners-Lee is a professor who specialises in carbon foot-printing. He is professor and fellow of the Institute for Social Futures at Lancaster University, and director and principal consultant at Small World Consulting, based in Lancaster Environment Centre.
