Reducing your Ecological Footprint

Reducing your Ecological Footprint

1. Food Choices

   • Avert the purchase of canned, packaged, and processed foods when shopping for groceries. Stick to fresh vegetables and locally produced goods. Production and shipping of processed items results in the excess usage of many resources such as water, energy and fuel. Moreover, transportation and shipping of these products causes excess carbon production that results in many complications such as polution and global warming.
   • Assign a weekday to go without consuming meat. Did you know that a meat based diet requires 7 times the land compared to a plant based diet? producing 1 pound of beef uses as much water as it takes for 60 showers!! Meat and meat products come from animals that require food, shelter, and nurture, which exhaust resources. By cutting down on meat consumption, you not only drastically reduce resource consumption, you improve your health. Research shows that vegetarians are 20% less likely to be diagnosed with Cancer!
   • Save leftover food after each meal. You can store the food in the fridge, in very affordable plastic containers available in the kitchen isle. You will avoid the wastage of food; You will have always have extra food in your fridge ( no need to turn to canned and processed alternatives); and you will cut down on trips to the grocery stored, which will then save, energy, money, time, and valuable resources.
   • Keep a regular record of your fridge inventory. That way, you can regulate and plan your grocery trips; Eliminate unnecessary trips to the grocery store; and brainstorm alternate food choices that are going to help you reduce your ecological foot print

2. Transportation

   • weigh you're options carefully before you choose a mean of transportation. in addition to that, you should also assess whether your trip is a want or a need. If your destination's at walking distance, it's in your and our planets best interest.
   • With the new age of technology, we have many means of communication. plenty of which include social media. reducing the amount of our transportation could immensely help in reducing our ecological foot print. If you are absolutely not needed at your friends house, you can perhaps consider using skype or facetime. This also applies to working; If you´re getting a drive to a friends house to work on a school project, communicate on Google Docs instead, it's fast, efficient,and can be done at the comfort of your own home!
   • Use transportation at the optimal hour. Avoid driving at rush-hour. The amount of Carbon and fuel emissions created during those times are 2 times the average since it takes approx. twice as long to get to your destination due to traffic. Furthermore, you should leave for your destination earlier; this means leaving for school or work earlier to avoid creating extra traffic at rush time which counts towards more resource use and carbon emmisions
   • Maximize your trips! plan your destination and travel route beforehand, and try to fit them all in one trip. That will drastically impact and decrease your fuel consumption as well as save time and aid in reducing your ecological footprint. For example, choose to buy your groceries on your way home from work at a local shop, instead of choosing another time to do so.
   • remove unnecessary weight from your car. Something I've begun to observe is that many families have extra stuff weighing down their car such as hockey gear or camping supplies. They often forget to remove those items from the car after use which increases the car's fuel consumption . By getting rid of excess weigh in your car, you increase your gas mileage, which makes your car much more fuel efficient.

3. housing

   • dryers
     • Instead of using a dryer machine, use a clothes rack to hang your clothes to dry them, dryers use an outrages amount of electricity to run. You will not only save energy, but money!
     • make sure your dryer is a recent model. Today's electric clothes dryers use at least 17 percent less energy than those produced in the 90's
   • thermostat
     • Try to keep your house temperature as low as possible in the winter. Adding a layer of clothes will keep you warm while being energy efficient.
     • adjust your thermostat responsibly according to weather
     • avoid using the AC as much as possible in the summer. instead, wear less clothes and open all windows for ventilation. However, if the AC is in use, make sure all the windows are closed to avoid excess energy use/loss
   • assure that any purchased appliances carry the energy efficient symbol. the ENERGY STAR® symbol is represented if/when an appliance qualifies as high efficiency. doing so can save a lot of money and keep your money where it belongs, in your pocket!
   • water usage
     • Attempt to decrease your washing machine usage, go for a once per week use at the maximum ( less frequent if possible ). In addition, avoid doing the laundry in the peak hours, and switch to a cold water activated detergent to wash clothes in cold water which will save energy and money!
     • When using the toilet in your own home, avoid flushing for #1s! try to minimize the amount of times you flush, and also try to stay away from flushing toilet paper as that increases water usage.

4. Smart Growth Plan Analysis

   • I believe that the main visible absence and shortage within my community in Richmond Hill is a range of housing opportunities and choices. More housing opportunities would make it possible for citizens that work in the community to have the preference and choice of living in the community. Doing so would thereby decrease intercity and/or intracity commuting, which then reduces carbon emissions and pollution. Moreover, encouraging the build of various housing options will promote a mixture of different incomes and age groups, which will certainly stabilize a community. Furthermore, I believe that affordable housing in Richmond Hill is certainly an issue. Due to house prices, Richmond Hill is only welcome to families with a fairly higher income, which immediately eliminates college students and the middle to lower class from becoming potential residents. keeping in mind the fact that lower mortgage rates mean higher housing prices and more competition in the market.

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