Environment

Ecological footprint

The previous practical exercise illustrated your personal ecological footprint in a simplified way. The further you were from the starting position, the bigger your personal footprint.

The ecological footprint measures how our behaviour and consumption affect the environment, that is whether we live sustainably or at the expense of future generations. This tells us how sustainable our individual lifestyles are as all the raw materials we need to eat, live, travel and so on, need space on the earth to regenerate. At the same time, however, nature needs resources to dispose of our waste, for example forests to bind carbon dioxide. The ecological footprint is therefore a measure of how much space on the earth is needed per person. It is measured in global hectares (gha).

If every person on the planet needed the same, we would each have to get by with 1.8 gha. Europeans, however, use 4.8 gha each on average. If everyone took so much space, we would need 2.7 Earths. This means we are living beyond our means, even if it varies regionally, as this diagram shows:

*BRIC: Brasilia, Russia, India, China

The ecological footprint is divided into 4 areas:

• Accommodation
• Nutrition
• Mobility
• Consumption

Before you deal with the four topics in more detail, research on the internet whether the ecological footprint is calculable for more than just individuals.

Sources

http://www.footprintrechner.at/footprint/info
www.footprintnetwork.org