Footprint of the ecological

Living as a college student, I thought my environmental impact would be minimal in comparison to what it was while living at home with my mother and father. I thought that by living with two other people in a cramped, triple room (with a bathroom :] ) would make me become more environmentally friendly or help me change my sustainable behaviors when it comes to how much I impact the environment. However, after reading Jim Merkel's Radical Simplicity and completing my very own ecological footprint, the smile that was wide-eyed across my beautiful face sharply fell to an ashamed form of pity and disgrace. I am single handedly killing this very own planet I take for granted every day. This might seem as a harsh statement to some, but given the calculations and data showing my footprint and how much energy and harmful items I consume that help degrade the environment, such a statement might seem more honest and truthful after all.

First, lets break things into context shall we. The average American ecological footprint is 24 acres per person. That number combines food, shelter, mobility, public transit, motorbike, car, air travel, goods, and services all added together to roughly equate the average amount of impact a normal American might have on the environment. In essence, that number roughly equals about 5.1 planets needed to help sustain everyones living habits. My living habits can be seen mainly by food, transportation, goods and services, stocks, and waste. Although I eat a lot of food, and consume a lot of waste, I rarely use any sort of transportation, because I am a college student without a car, although I do use the rail and bus transits quite frequently, goods and services, and stocks.Therefore, you would think that by having only a footprint based on those categories it would be small and minimal right? Haha... not quite. I am a very wasteful person, and it's not that I want to be, it's just that I have been raised culturally by my family to always use as much as possible and never think that there isn't enough for my needs. If only I knew I much I was wasting before, I would have changed my habits radically.

As such, my ecological footprint, based on food, transportation, goods and services, stocks, and waste, was a slightly higher than the average American footprint. My ecological footprint was, after summing all the categories, 28.83 acres. Now, let the deserved bashing take its place. At first, after summing up and calculating the numbers in each category based on acres, I was shocked, and also felt a little depression, which caused me to have a little Dr. Phil moment and collect myself that such a number is false and cannot be true and that I was only kidding and blah blah blah... Well, as much as would like it to be untrue, the fact remains that 28.83 is my real ecological footprint for a week. Compared to the average American, I waste way more and practice hardly any sustainable behavior in helping the world. Compared to the average American footprint, which is 24 acres and would need 5.1 planets to help sustain life and all the waste, my footprint was 28.83 acres, 4 whole plus acres than the average American, which would need about 6.1 planets to help sustain just my living alone. I'm sorry world, but I think I am killing you single handedly. I mean, after looking at that number and comparing it to the average American, I just felt horrible. My footprint alone measures roughly around 120% of a US footprint. I had thought that my footprint would be considerably lower than the average because of my status as a college student and living in a compact three person room, while having no car for my personal transportation. However, I realized that I waste and degrade the environment way more than I anticipated.

Looking at my data for the specific categories, food, transportation, goods and services, stocks, and waste, I was intrigued at to how my footprint was so large. I realized that my food and waste footprints were slightly more than the average, with 4.04 acres and 5.93 acres respectively. This didn't surprise at all given that I do like to eat a lot of food, meat in particular, as well as veggies, potatoes, and fruit, and that given my waste accumulation of paper products and plastic items and other forms of waste, I was hardly surprised. What surprised me the most was that the category I thought would have no affect on the outcome of my footprint actually was the biggest factor. Transportation. I know that since I am a college student having a car wouldn't be the most efficient to have, given that that I can't even find a parking area for at least a day here at UCLA. However, that didn't eliminate my rides on buses and trains that I usually take to go home or to visit other areas. Looking at my transportation footprint, which was 10.29 acres, I was surprised at how often I do take the bus and train. In addition, during the week that I was calculating my footprint, I had taken a flight to Berkeley to visit some friends and just take a break. Even adding just one airplane flight into my total footprint for transportation had an enormous affect on the outcome of my total footprint. All things considered given the results of transportation footprint, lets just say I wont be flying or taking the bus or train for a very, very, very long time.

Now, after evaluating and seeing the horrors of my own personal footprint, I think that from now on I will practice more sustainable behaviors and practices so to limit the amount of my footprint and impact on the environment. Therefore, I will have short, medium, and long term goals so as to achieve my limits. My short term goal will be to radically lower my transportation and waste accumulation my taking the bus and train less and figuring out ways to carpool with friends, so as to lower both fuel consumption and the impact on the environment. For my waste footprint, my short term goal will be to start being practical with my paper and plastic waste and only use a certain amount of paper necessary for school and other needs. In addition, I should start using my computer from now so as to become more paperless, as well as become more efficient and responsible with my note taking. I feel like if these short term goals can be met and reached at the end of the quarter, my total ecological footprint would decrease by a large amount.

my medium and long term goals would be to decrease my food waste by eating more organic and veggie type items instead of meat and higher-0n-the-food-chain type items, which uses more energy. I plan on eating lower on the food chain by eating more vegetarian type items, as well as mixing in a salad now and then into my diet so as to save more energy, and also to improve my overall health. In addition, I plan on eating out a lot less and becoming more self sufficient my cooking more of my own so as to minimalize my total effect on the environment. In addition, for my medium and long term goals, I plan on carpooling a lot more and only using the bus on certain occasions that are necessary for me. Before, I would always take the bus with friends every day because we always wanted to see all the cool places in LA, especially the areas like Venice and downtown LA. However, after realizing the total effect such traveling may have on the environment, I realize now that should travel less on the bus and train and should only travel on days that are deemed important, as well as focus more on taking carpools instead of going home by myself on the bus.

All in all, I hope that, if these goals are met, I will become a better person and more eco-friendly by lowering my total ecological footprint to levels that are, hopefully, below the average American, as well as practicing more sustainable behaviors so as to help the world survive for a very long time.