Why aren’t we more involved in caring about our planet? You may think the little things you do like powering your phone up to charge, running your dryer for 40 minutes, or even going out for a nice steak dinner at a 5 star restaurant may not have anything to do with carbon emissions, but it does. My personal overshoot day is May 7th. An overshoot day is calculated from how much carbon the earth can take in a year, ecologically. It’s based on the carbon emissions from everyday technology that we use. The further the date in the year, the worse it is. May is not the worst ever, but i’m only one person out of 7 billion people on this earth. The number of earths that would be needed to sustain my lifestyle would be 2.9. And there would need to be 131 tree seedlings (grown over 10 years) planted to keep up with my lifestyle! An average overshoot day for an American is March 15th, compared to somebody who lives in the United Kingdom, it’s May 8th. For the whole world, it’s August 2nd. Carbon dioxide may be small factor in our atmosphere, but it has a huge effect on the earth’s temperature. We inhale oxygen, we exhale carbon dioxide. Carbon cycles through animals, humans, land, water, and air constantly. Carbon is in everything. As we exhale, trees absorb our carbon, when animals eat plants or other animals they absorb carbon, and when those animals die carbon is released back into the atmosphere, soil, and into the water as well. This cycle continues. As we continue to burn fossil fuel for electricity, we mess up the delicate carbon cycle. Trees are meant to absorb carbon, but as we are cutting them down, the carbon gets stuck in our atmosphere which causes global warming. Yes, we do need to grow more trees to absorb the carbon. But that will take years! Our global PPM (parts per million) just passed 400. The global PPM safe number is 350. Which means the levels of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere are not good. We have seen this number rise recently which has ended up in climate change causing extreme weather. In order to reduce this number, we need to stop using, and financing so much fossil fuel, and we need to act quick. One of the activists for the 350 goal Deirdre Smith said “If we expect to handle the rising carbon levels in the sky, we will have to start contending with the power on the ground.”
One way we can reduce our carbon footprint is to cut out eating beef and dairy. Beef and dairy is hard on our digestion system anyways, any health guru will tell you that. One of the biggest contributors to carbon emissions is deforestation. We cut down so many trees for land to be used to buildings - or agriculture. Most cows are raised on lands that used to be a forest. We can suck and absorb carbon dioxide by what’s called “direct air capture.” Researchers have binded different chemicals together with carbon dioxide molecules, and when heated up can be released into the air to capture the carbon. Once the carbon is captured, it has to be stored. It is a very possible solution, but we will have to have these machines all over the world to do it. In chapter 7 of the book “Raising Elijah” Sandra Stiengraber suggests three ways to reduce your co2 footprint. One is starting a compost bin, another is drying your clothes on a clothesline or rack outside, and the last is using a man-powered lawn mower. I agree and love all three of these ideas because they eliminate co2 in our air, water, and land. I’m proposing that we act now on reducing our carbon footprint. You don’t have to spend any extra money, and you don’t need a lot of time. There are so many ways you can reduce your carbon footprint by just putting one of the ideas from this website into your schedule, daily routine or daily habits. Set reminders on your phone. Instead of throwing your clothes in the dryer, hang them outside to dry. Instead of eating beef for dinner, try leaner meats like chicken or turkey. We have power to change the number to 350, by educating ourselves and helping to educate others.
Works Cited: "25+ Tips To Reduce Carbon Footprint From COTAP.Org". Cotap.Org, 2019, https://cotap.org/reduce-carbon-footprint/#food. Accessed 25 Mar 2019. Freidman, Lisa, and Henry Fountain. "Can We Really Scrub Carbon Dioxide From The Atmosphere?". Nytimes.Com, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/28/climate/remove-co2-from-air.html. Accessed 25 Mar 2019. "400.350.Org". 400.350.Org, 2019, http://400.350.org/#what-this-means. Accessed 27 Mar 2019. "About Earth Overshoot Day". Earth Overshoot Day, 2019, https://www.overshootday.org/about-earth-overshoot-day/. Accessed 26 Mar 2019. "Greenhouse Gas Equivalencies Calculator | US EPA". US EPA, 2019, https://www.epa.gov/energy/greenhouse-gas-equivalencies-calculator. Accessed 26 Mar 2019.