Bigfoot Sightings

In honor of Earth Day on April 22, I will be devoting several of this week's posts to environmental issues. Today I'd like to talk about your shoes. No, not the fact that you've chosen to wear charcoal grey slacks with brown dress-tennies (although that's also a problem). Rather, I'd like to talk about your footprint — your carbon footprint.

Your carbon footprint measures the extent of the adverse impact you have on the environment merely through virtue of your existence in a modern industrial society. The measurement is based on the estimated amount of CO2 emissions you produce each day. The less "green" your lifestyle, the greater your carbon footprint.

The Environmental Protection Agency offers one of many Carbon Footprint Calculators (although they call theirs a Personal Emissions Calculator because if they used the parlance of the people their collective head would explode). According to the EPA, the average two-person household produces about 41,500 pounds of carbon emissions over the course of the year. My husband and I came in at an estimated 33,500. That's better than average, but given the consumption averages of the stereotypical American, that's like saying we're funnier than Jamie Kennedy.

Another fun calculator is at Carbon Footprint. Their calculator allows for more detailed information in terms of dietary habits, travel habits and so forth. My carbon footprint there came out to 7.654. That just a little over one-third of the average American's carbon footprint (20), about two-thirds of the average First-Worlder (11), but almost twice as much as that produced by the average human worldwide (4). I suppose for an imperialist swine I'm doing pretty well (I suspect not eating meat has a lot do with it), but given the worldwide target of 2...

My feet hurt.

But the news isn't all tragic! According to the EPA, if my husband and I replaced six light bulbs in our home with energy-efficient bulbs, it would reduce our annual carbon shoe size by two percent. Done and done.

Click here to see what you can do to quit kicking the planet in the face.