How Are You Doing Carbon-wise?

Try an App to Help You Go Carbon Aware To Carbon Free - Net Carbon Zero

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Climate change has put our very existence at stake. To avoid catastrophe, it’s essential that we reprioritize for our survival and make real changes at every level.

More to the Story: 'The Carbon Footprint' Marketing Campaign

Via Mashable 'Social Good' Series

British Petroleum, or BP, first promoted and soon successfully popularized the term “carbon footprint" in the early aughts. The company unveiled its “carbon footprint calculator” in 2004 so one could assess how their normal daily life — going to work, buying food, and (gasp) traveling — is largely responsible for heating the globe. A decade and a half later, “carbon footprint” is everywhere. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has a carbon calculator. The New York Times has a guide on “How to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint.” Mashable published a story in 2019 entitled “How to shrink your carbon footprint when you travel.” Outdoorsy brands love the term.

“This is one of the most successful, deceptive PR campaigns maybe ever,” said Benjamin Franta, who researches law and history of science as a J.D.-Ph.D. student at Stanford Law School.

Of course, no one should be shamed for declaring an intention to “reduce their carbon footprint.” That’s because BP’s advertising campaign proved brilliant. The oil giant infused the term into our normal, everyday lexicon. (And the sentiment is not totally wrong — some personal efforts to strive for a cleaner world do matter.) But there’s now powerful, plain evidence that the term “carbon footprint” was always a sham, and should be considered in a new light — not the way a giant oil conglomerate, who just a decade ago leaked hundreds of millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, wants to frame your climate impact...

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Katharine Hayhoe shares her point of view on why to go "carbon neutral"

"I’m a climate scientist. I don’t “believe” in climate change: I crunch the data, look at the numbers, and draw the most sensible and reasonable conclusions. So whoever these believers are, they aren’t me.

"I also talk to people about climate change all the time: and I’ve never once told anyone to reduce their carbon footprint to zero. So whoever’s going around saying that, it’s not me or anyone I’ve ever heard.

"Why don’t I recommend this? BECAUSE MOST OF US CAN’T. We live in a world where the options to remove all carbon emissions from our lives are largely too expensive or unavailable. And even if everyone in the US eliminated their personal carbon footprint, what about emissions from industry and manufacturing?

"That’s why we need system-wide change at all levels. Yes, reducing our personal carbon footprint helps. But the single most important thing I tell people to do is, talk about it! Share with others why it’s so important. Vote on this issue. Ask elected officials what their solutions are, no matter what part of the political spectrum they’re from.

"A thermometer isn’t liberal or conservative. It doesn’t give us a different answer depending on how we vote. But the solutions are: and that’s why we need all voices at the table."