Heya!! I played around with the ecological footprint calculator too, and here's my results and some thoughts.
First thing is, the calculator does not have an option for Singapore, so I chose Australia instead for the quiz. Thus I'm expecting at least some margin of error in the results I obtained, due to the differences in our 2 countries.
For example, there was one question asking about the consumption of local foods, with local being defined as less than 325km away. 325km away from me is probably way over in Malaysia or Indonesia, so I had a hard time trying to decide how to answer that.
| Category | Global Hectares |
| Food | 51% |
| Mobility | 4% |
| Shelter | 9% |
| Goods/Services | 25% |
| Total | 2.6 |
| Number of Planets | 2.2 |
Same as Janice, I explored the scenarios in the calculator. Since this tutorial's about campus sustainability, I picked only the options which I, as a student, is capable of implementing.
Reducing the amount of animal-products eaten by half decreases the number of Earths from 2.2 to 1.9, which to me was quite amazing as I eat red meat less than 3 times a week already. However, I do consume chicken, eggs and milk almost everyday, and I suppose it won't kill to cut down on those.
Purchasing products that used less packaging or were made out of 100% (PCR) recycled material would cause a reduction to 2. I guess this may not be very feasible in Singapore as everything that can be bought comes with pretty packaging. I do make an effort to not take plastic bags from the cashiers though, and use my own bags instead.
The other options did not seem to be things which I can control, so I didn't bother listing them here.
With regards to NUS, check out this site for the things which the university has done in the name of environmental sustainability (http://www.nus.edu.sg/oes/). A new Office has just been set up, so this official movement is still in its infacy stage. However, a well-publicised campaign has been circulating around the university and generating quite successful results so far. The campaign focuses on many different aspects of campus life and enforces ways for the students to "give back" to the environment. Age-old methods like the setting up of recycling bins is one of the moves. Others include the setting of all campus printers to double-sided printing option and the charging of 10 cents for every plastic bag taken from the Co-op bookstore in school. These new methods are more like enforcements rather than genuine concern for the environment on the student's part, but they do cut down on NUS' ecological footprint significantly.
However, I believe that wastage is the major problem facing NUS now. We should learn to save in the first place, instead of just coming up with new ideas. For example, setting all thermostats in lecture theatres to 25 degrees is a good way to save up on electricity (though as Janice pointed out, they don't seem to be keeping to this rule very well). Yet, there was this one time when I went back to school at night looking for a quiet place to study. It was around 12 midnight, and I happened to peek inside an unlocked lecture theatre. To my surprise, all the lights and even the air-conditioning was on though there was obviously nobody there, and I suspect that this is a common occurence. Imagine the wastage, all 32 lecture theatres on campus, guzzling on electricity all night long.
That's all I have for now. Hope to hear some views from the ANU side! :)
Hi so sorry about that as I've lost my account. But I've signed up as a follower. Our carbon footprint is really determined by what we consume and this certainly has an impact on resource use. Consuming less meat would mean being more ecofriendly as the amount of energy that goes into the production of meat is really immense!
ReplyDeleteAs for NUS, I still feel that it is not really that ecofriendly yet although there are steps taken at the moment such as cutting back on plastic bag use. Anyway I was just standing behind one shuttle bus which reads "NUS fights climate change". A few seconds later, as the bus was moving off, a cloud of black smoke spewed out from the exhaust pipe of the bus. I feel that more could be done including requesting the shuttle bus company to change into more ecofriendly bus such as those that run on CNG. Certainly it is feasible to do so and there has to certainly be a central control that sets the temperature to 25 degrees in the LTs as they are still too cold for comfort. Lastly, the NUS staff and students who drive have to be taxed according to the kind of vehicle they drive into the university. Generally, bigger cars will have to invite more tax when they park in the campus to discourage the use of fuel guzzling cars. Thats all for now.=) Can someone resend me an invitation? My email is u0500268@nus.edu.sg