What is the Ecological Footprint?

Humans need food, shelter and heating (in some locations) to

survive. Our planet’s ecological resources help fulfil these
needs. But how many resources do we consume? This question
can be answered using the Ecological Footprint.

Just as a bank statement tracks income against expenditures,

Ecological Footprint accounting measures a population’s
demand for natural ecosystems’ supply of resources and
services.
On the demand side,
the Ecological Footprint measures an individual or a
population’s demand for plant-based food and fiber products,
livestock and fish products, timber and other forest products,
space for urban infrastructure, and forest to absorb its carbon
dioxide emissions from fossil fuels.
On the supply side,
a city, state, or nation’s biocapacity represents its biologically
productive land and sea area, including forest lands, grazing
lands, cropland, fishing grounds, and built-up land.
The Ecological Footprint can be calculated for a
single individual, city, region, country and the entire planet.
The gap between Ecological Footprint and biocapacity is
determined by several factors. Our personal Footprint is the
product of how much we use and how efficiently this is being
produced. The biocapacity per person is determined by how
many hectares of productive area there is, how productive each
hectare is, and how many people (in a city, country, or the
world) share this biocapacity.
Many countries are “in the red,” which means they use more
natural resources (Ecological Footprint) than their ecosystems
can regenerate (biocapacity). They are running an “ecological
 deficit.” When a country’s biocapacity is greater than its
population’s Ecological Footprint, on the other hand, the country
boasts an “ecological reserve.”
Nations (also cities and states) can run ecological deficits by
liquidating their own resources, such as by overfishing;
importing resources from other areas; and/or emitting more
carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than their own ecosystems
can absorb.
What is Earth Overshoot Day?
When the entire planet is running an ecological deficit, we call it
“overshoot.” At the global level, ecological deficit and overshoot
are the same, since there is no net import of resources to the
planet.
Suggestions
1. Reduce Your Use of Single-Use, Disposable Plastics. ...
2. Switch to Renewable Energy. ...
3. Eat Less Meat. ...
4. Reduce your Waste. ...
5. Recycle Responsibly. ...
6. Drive Less. ...
7. Reduce Your Water Use. ...
8. Support Local.
Reduce Your Ecological Footprint

An ecological footprint measures humans'

consumption of natural resources against the Earth’s
ecological capacity (biocapacity) to regenerate them.

According to the Global Footprint Network, we

currently consume more resources per year than our
planet can produce in the same timeframe. Their
calculations show that it takes the planet 18 months to
regenerate everything that we use in a 12 month period. In
2017, Earth Overshoot Day was August 2nd - meaning
that by that date we had taken more from nature
than our planet is able to renew in the whole year.
There are many simple things you can do to reduce your
ecological footprint. Learn how to reduce your footprint in
each consumption category - transportation, housing, food
and goods. To discover your own biggest areas of resource
consumption and compare your own footprint to others',
check out our roundup of the best ecological footprint
calculators.

Use Cleaner Transportation

 Don't drive when there is an alternative! Walk,

bike, or take public transport whenever possible. If you
don't own and drive a car on average you can reduce your
total ecological footprint by as much as 20 per cent.
Using it less will reduce your footprint, helps to avoid
traffic jam and keeps your city’s air cleaner. A 2011
study carried out by the European Cycling
Federation compared carbon emissions from a bicycle
(including manufacturing) to motorised vehicles and
found that for every passenger kilometre travelled by
bike, 21 grams of carbon were released as opposed to 271
grams for someone riding or driving in a car and 101
grams for people taking the bus.
 If you need a car make it a small as possible one
and reduce the mileage. Smaller, and mainly smaller-
engined, cars are usually much more energy efficient
than larger ones.
 Check your car regularly. Have your vehicle serviced
regularly to keep the emission control systems operating
at peak efficiency. Check your car's air filter monthly, and
 keep the tires adequately inflated to maximise gas
mileage. If you sit idle for more than 30 seconds, turn off
the engine (except in traffic).
 Avoid short airplane trips - take a bus or train
instead. Flights cause a large and growing part of our
collective footprint - it has two to four times the impact
of CO2 emissions on climate change because it releases
water vapour and nitrous oxide at high altitude. If you
can't avoid flying, make clearing donations to projects on
climate protection. Or utilise the emission calculator
on atmosfair to figure out how much greenhouse gas
emissions are caused by your flights. With your donation
to atmosfair you enable them to run projects where these
emissions will be saved.

Add Energy-Saving Features to Your Home

 Install energy-saving lamps in your home - but be

sure to dispose of old bulbs safely.
 Make sure your walls and ceilings are insulated,
and consider double-pane windows. Explore green
design features for your building, like passive solar
heating, a rainwater catchment or greywater recycling
system, and recycled materials.
 Choose energy efficient appliances, including low
flow shower heads, faucets, and toilets.
 Choose furnishings that are second-hand,
recycled, or sustainably produced.
 Use biodegradable, non-toxic cleaning products
- for your health and environment.

Cultivate Energy-Saving Habits

 Keep the thermostat relatively low in winter and

ease up on the air conditioning in summer. Keep
your A/C filters clean to keep the A/C operating at peak
efficiency. Take a look at our tips for keeping cool
without A/C.
 Unplug your electronics when not in use. To make
it easier, use a power strip. Even when turned off, items
like your television, computer, and cellphone charger still
sip power.
 Dry your clothes naturally whenever
possible rather than using power-guzzling tumble
dryers.
 Defrost your refrigerator and freezer regularly.

Reduce your Foods and Goods Footprint

 Shop at your local farmer's market. Look for local,

in-season foods that haven't travelled long distances to
reach you. Organic and other forms of low-input farming
that use minimal or no pesticides and fertilisers – which
are energy intensive in their manufacture – consume up
to 40 per cent less energy, and support higher levels of
wildlife on farms.
 Choose foods with less packaging to reduce waste.
 Plant a garden! Growing our own fruit and vegetables
reduces all the energy and waste which normally goes
into getting food from the field to our plates – such as
transport, refrigeration and packaging. In your garden
you can compost food waste as well. Garbage that is not
contaminated with degradable (biological) waste can be
more easily recycled and sorted.
 Going meatless for just one meal a week can
make a difference - more often is even better! The
livestock industry contributes more greenhouse gas
emissions globally than the transport sector and the
ecological footprint of vegetarians is estimated to
be around half that of meat eaters.
 Buy less! Try to get your things repaired - this supports
local business and avoids waste. Replace items only when
you really need to and try to buy quality products that
will have a longer life-span.
 Recycle all your paper, glass, aluminum, and
plastic. Don't forget electronics! Do an online search to
find the recycling options in your area.

Try Out Easy Ways to Save Water

 Take shorter, less frequent showers - this saves

water and the energy necessary to heat it.

 Run the dishwasher and the washing machine

only when full.
 Wash your car less often. Take it to a carwash;
usually commercial carwashes use less water per wash
than you would need at home.
 Avoid hosing down or power-washing your deck,
walkways, or driveway. Regularly look for and fix
leaks.
 Plant drought-tolerant plants in your garden and
yard.

Find more water-saving tips here.

Purchase carbon offsets

Saving is advance is always better than paying afterwards,

but for the carbon emissions you can't eliminate,
sometimes you have the option to purchase carbon offsets.
Individuals, companies, or governments purchase carbon
offsets to mitigate their own greenhouse gas emissions
from transportation, electricity use, and other sources. For
example, an individual might purchase carbon offsets to
compensate for the greenhouse gas emissions caused by
personal air travel. One example is Atmosfair, that uses
an emissions calculator to figure out how much
greenhouse gas emissions are caused by individual flights
and offers carbon offsets. 

Save Water: Reduce Your Water Footprint

People use lots of water for drinking, cooking and

washing but even more for producing things such as
food, paper and cloth.
 

A water footprint is an indicator that looks at both

the direct and indirect water use of an individual,
business, community, city or country.

Direct water use refers to the water we see coming

out of the tap: the fresh water we use each day for
drinking, cooking, showering, washing dishes and clothes,
and gardening etc.

Indirect water use refers to the water that is used

to manufacture the goods that we consume or
produce, and the services that we use, as well as all
of the water that is made unusable by pollution or wasted
by non-use. That includes all of the water used to grow the
food that we eat eat, to produce the things we use in daily
life - clothes, books and furniture - and the water needed
to produce the energy we use.

While this indirect water is "invisible", we often

use far more of it than we realise.

In Europe, for example, the average

person directly consumes between 100-150 litres
of water a day - as drinking water, for washing clothes,
bathing and watering plants.

But each person also indirectly consumes

anywhere between 1,500 and 10,000 litres of per
day, depending on where they live and their consumption
habits.

Measuring water footprints can give us a clear picture of

how water is used in today's society, and help us come up
with strategies for more sustainable water usage.

Some Facts and Figures About Water Use

 Water covers 70.9 percent of the planet’s surface.

 97 per cent of the that water is salt water.
 Around the world, 2.1 billion people still lack access to
safe water.
 Water use is growing at twice the rate of population
growth. Unless this trend is reversed and we come up
with a way to share water fairly and sustainably
 throughout the planet, two-thirds of the global
population will face water “stress” by 2025
 In the USA, the average water footprint per year per
capita is as much as the water needed to fill an Olympic
swimming pool, an average of 7,786 litres of water per
person per day.
 In China, the average water footprint is 2,934 litres of
water per person per day.
 In the Netherlands, 95 per cent of the water footprint of
consumption lies somewhere else in the world (due to
the amount of imported goods consumed), whereas in
India and Paraguay only 3 per cent of the national water
footprint of consumption is external.
 It requires around 1500 litres of water to produce 1
kilogram of wheat, and a huge 10 times more to produce
the same amount of beef.
 The water footprint of a cup of coffee is around 140 litres,
a cup of tea only around 34 litres.

Your Footprint Calculator

The Water Footprint Network website offers an online

calculator which estimates your personal water footprint,
based on your country of residence and your patterns of
consumption:

You can check out the quick individual water footprint

calculator and the extended individual water footprint
calculator here.
How to Reduce Your Water Footprint

Broadly speaking, you can reduce your direct water

footprint by:

 turning off the tap while brushing your teeth

 using water-saving toilets
 installing a water-saving shower head
 taking shorter showers
 only washing your clothes when necessary
 fixing household leaks
 using less water in the garden and when cleaning
 not disposing of medicines, paints or other pollutants
down the sink.

When it comes to reducing your indirect water

footprint, there are a number of different approaches you
can take.

The food we eat makes up a huge part of our personal

water footprints, and implementing some of these changes
could have knock-on benefits for your health too.
Examples include:

Eating less meat. Beef is one of the most water-intensive

proteins, needing 15,000 litres of water per kg, followed by
red meats in general. Other, less water-intensive
proteins include pulses like beans, lentils and peas.
Chicken has a much lower water footprint than beef, so if
you're not ready to become vegetarian or vegan just yet,
giving up or just cutting back on red meat can help.

Switching coffee for tea. Cups of tea and coffee may

look like they contain the same amounts of liquid, but
producing coffee beans requires far more water than
growing tea leaves, around 140 litres for a cup of coffee
and around 34 litres for tea.

Cutting down on sugar. Drinking a bottle of cola

actually consumes around two or three bathtubs full of
water. Growing sugar cane uses a lot of water (and often
water-polluting pesticides too), not to mention the water
that goes into producing plastic packaging.

Eating less processed food. Water is required at every

stage of food production - refining, processing, canning,
packaging. Eating fresher food means consuming less
water, sugar, salt, preservatives and chemicals.

Consuming more local produce. Producing a tank of

petrol requires a lot of water, so reducing the amount of
miles you food has to cover from farm to plate will also
help save. And your food will be fresher and more rich in
vitamins too. Win-win!

Buying quality, not quantity. The clothes we wear use

huge amounts of freshwater. Cotton fabrics and denim
jeans are particularly greedy. Buy well-made clothes that
are intended to last, rather than huge amounts of cheaply-
produced items that will need to be replaced. The same
goes for any other consumer product, as practically all
manufactured products - from electronics to books and
cosmetics - consume water in the production process.
Buying less will protect the world's water supply and your
wallet.

The responsibility for cutting back on water consumption

shouldn't just lie with consumers, of course. For people to
be able to make informed decisions about which options to
choose, businesses need to be transparent about
their processes, and governments more forward-
thinking when it comes to regulation. When
information is available on the impacts of a certain article
on the water system, consumers can make conscious
choices about what they buy. And if governments were to
bring in water-saving measures, businesses would be
incentivised or perhaps even obligated, to introduce water-
saving measures.

More Tips for Saving Water at Home

Install a foot tap. Rather than using the traditional,

ubiquitous twist-knob taps, you can install a foot pedal
which you press to control the flow of water. Using such
pedals helps reduce water consumption by as much as 50
percent.

Attach a shower head to tap fittings. Installing a

shower head on your tap might sound a bit strange, but
trust us on this one. It is a common misconception that
high-pressure, high-volume water is needed to clean tough
dirt and grease from dishes. In fact, what is more effective
is using a wide water spray rather than heavy water
volume which of course can be achieved through the use of
a shower head. Fitting a water-saving showerhead to your
tap will still give you enough water and spray to clean
effectively, meaning you use less water even when washing
the tough stuff.

Bring a bucket. A peek into any bathroom in Australia

provides a handy water-saving tip from the inhabitants of
the driest continent on the planet - place a bucket in the
shower. These buckets are placed under the showerhead to
catch all that excess water that normally goes down the
drain while you wait for the water to heat up.

Treat your wastewater at home. Generally speaking,

all that water that trickles down the drain after you use it
can actually be a boon for the garden. Commonly referred
to as wastewater (or blackwater and greywater), leftover
water from the bathroom, kitchen and laundry is mixed
with detergents, oil and dirt and is generally not
appropriate for use in the garden in its waste form.
However, with proper filtering and treatment it can be
highly beneficial for crops. Treehugger has some resources
here on how to reuse greywater in your home and garden.

Use eco-friendly cleaning products. Using

biodegradable cleaners (i.e. natural items such as lemon,
tea tree oil, baking soda and vinegar) as well as phosphate-
free detergents also helps to reduce water consumption
and is less harmful to the environment. Using them to
clean uses less water than chemically-laden alternatives.
One reason for this is the inclusion of Sodium Lauryl
Sulfate (SLS) in many conventional cleaning products. SLS
is generally used as a foaming agent, its foaming
properties triggered when coming into contact with water.
These agents also need to be washed off any surface or
item after use considering the harmful impact they have
on human health.