The carbon footprint of a North American is much larger than the carbon footprint of someone from China or Japan. This is partially related to the size of homes; houses in Canada and the USA are much much larger than the average household size in China and Japan. A contributing factor to this size difference is the land; China is very populous and therefore must fit more people into a smaller space. Similarly, Japan has a large population, but also has many inhabitable mountains, forcing people to crowd into the valleys. Canada and the USA both have a lot of flat space for people to spread out on. Also, the population density contributes to the carbon footprint. The USA has a larger area, and population than Japan, but since Japan has 1/3 the population the USA does, and much less than 1/3 the space, they are more crowded.
Thus, we could reduce our carbon footprints by living in smaller quarters. This is hard to correct though, because most people do not have the fund to design and build their own house. They must buy what contractors build or what is already for sale, which is much larger than people need for the small families we have over here.
Another way to reduce our carbon footprints is to reuse dishes. By reusing dishes that are only slightly dirty, you reduce the number of dirty dishes needed to be washed, which then, would reduce the water consumption per household. For example, I use a maximum of only two cups a day, no matter how many times I have a drink. One cup is designated for milk, which gets washed daily, and the other cup is for juice, or water, which gets washed every other day. I drink an average of 5 glasses of liquid a day. If I wasn’t reusing my cups, I would have an output of 5 cups/day instead of only 2 cups/day. Over a week, this turns into 35 cups/week versus 14 cups/week. For a year, 1825 cups/year versus 730 cups/year. Once you factor in the amount of water it takes to wash a cup, which I will estimate at around 250mL, you can clearly see that single handedly, I am saving 273L of water, and that’s only from reusing cups. I also reuse plates, which saves even more water. This is still sanitary, as I do not reuse any dish to an extreme amount, but still do not produce an exorbitant amount of dishes per day.
Another way I save water, is by letting my dishes air dry. I do not have a dish-washer, so I must wash the dishes by hand here. I turn the tap on only when I need it, to help conserve water, but I also let my dishes air dry in a dish drainer instead of hand-drying them with a dish towel. This is a thrice daily occurrence, thus I am saving three dish towels per day. Assuming that it takes 50 dish towels for a load of laundry, by just letting my dishes air dry, I am saving the amount of water it takes to do 22 loads of laundry per year.
Some more quick and easy ways I try to reduce my carbon footprint is by turning the lights off and using daylight whenever possible. By turning power bars off when I don’t need them, and by taking shorter showers. I also bring my own grocery bags to grocery stores, and don’t own a car. I ride the bus, or walk to my destination if possible.
As you can clearly see, it is extremely easy for one person to reduce their carbon footprint and water consumption. If every household did these simple actions, it would greatly reduce the carbon footprints of North Americans. This would have a positive impact on the environment because a fairly populous, first-world country would be setting an example for the rest of the world (even though, North Americans have the largest carbon footprints of them all). If we can reduce water consumption by that much, just by reusing a few dishes, think of how much we could shrink our carbon footprints by doing something slightly more difficult.
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