Carbon footprint
What is a carbon footprint?
The is the emitted over the of a product, service or event.
It includes everything: extracting the raw materials, manufacturing, transporting, using and disposing of the product.
A person's carbon footprint includes the energy used for their home, their travel (especially flights and car journeys) and their food — beef, for example, has a large footprint because cattle produce methane.
Key terms
Reducing carbon footprints
Ways to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and methane include:
- using alternative energy sources, such as wind, solar and nuclear, instead of fossil fuels
- conserving energy, e.g. better insulation and more efficient appliances and vehicles
- — collecting CO₂ from power stations and storing it underground
- carbon taxes and licences that make polluting more expensive
- , such as planting trees to absorb CO₂
- making products , so they cause no overall increase in greenhouse gases
Key terms
Why it's difficult
Reducing carbon footprints is hard because of:
- disagreement about the causes and consequences of climate change
- a lack of public information and education
- people not wanting to change their lifestyles, e.g. flying or driving less
- economic reasons: new technology costs money, and developing countries need cheap energy to grow
- countries not cooperating fully, when everyone has to act together for it to work