In the September/October SIERRA, Paul Rauber’s article on/review of carbon imprint calculators is of very great interest! I did one of these before but I do not know how good it was. It said we would need 5 earths if everyone lived like me.
It seems that the Berkeley Institute of the environment, at coolclimate.berkeley.edu, is the best. It gives you results in metric tons of co2 per year. Another, which gave the writer a similar result, and is commercial and sells appliances but then again, does give suggestions for what you can do is lowimpactliving.com (click on “impact calculator”). That calculator says I am a “pretty low impact person” but I am not sure that is true.
This is a fun and educational game and it is also reading for pleasure.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
I did one of those one time, I think it was that calculator, that showed that my inprint was zero, even including a couple of trips to the Mainland. We have so many trees around, many of them fruit bearing. We produce more electricity than we use (solar hot water, photovoltaics). We fill up the tank of our one car maybe every three weeks. Much of our food is locally grown. I did include two trips to the Mainland in the calculations and still came out zero.
However, I didn’t include the condo in Seattle. We consider that a good investment, though, a place that provides us with a second home and that is useful to friends and relatives as well. It’s small, well insulated and energy efficient. Everything gets recycled. The bus line to downtown and the University stop right across the street.
I think probably travel except to see our kids or for business is something we won’t be doing much of in the future. It isn’t much fun any more. I can’t eat restaurant food and tend to get sick with colds and flus. I’m glad I got to travel when I was young!
What strikes me is the way people consume a lot of resources and don’t have a high standard of living to show for it. They may be driving miles to their low-paying jobs, for instance.
I meant footprint, of course. Still getting over being on the plane yesterday. Wasn’t a bad trip, actually, but flying fries my brain.
H – welcome home!
This is striking indeed:
“What strikes me is the way people consume a lot of resources and don’t have a high standard of living to show for it. They may be driving miles to their low-paying jobs, for instance.”