My ecological footprint, 5.9 planets

[darthdavid]

4.2 planets for me.

[Civil War Man]

All electric power sources have a Footprint for their construction and operation. The combustion of fossil fuels for electricity generates carbon dioxide, among other wastes and serious environmental effects. Coal-powered electricity generation has a bigger Footprint than electricity from natural gas. Using electricity from renewable "green" sources like wind, solar, and small-scale hydropower substantially reduces your Ecological Footprint.

More BS. Solar panels pollute the ever loving crap out of mother earth during the fabrication process. Silicon etching is energy intensive, requires a dozen nasty chemicals, and requires loads of fresh water.

On another note with this point, I know that wind farms take up huge tracts of land in order to generate a decent amount of power. In terms of efficiency, how does it compare with other methods of power generation?

Plus, there's also the problem of location. The "green" sources they talk about require you live in certain areas in order to reap the benefits. Wind power obviously requires sustained wind to generate enough power, and would be ineffective in areas that don't get high winds. Solar power's fine in places like San Diego, California, but wouldn't be nearly as effective in places more prone to overcast weather like, say, Syracuse, New York. And obviously, hydroelectric power requires a location within striking distance of a water source, in particular a river...

...and aren't a lot of environmentalists railing against hydroelectric power because it requires damming up rivers?

[fgalkin]

IF EVERYONE LIVED LIKE YOU, WE WOULD NEED 4.9 PLANETS.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Xero Cool Down]

2.5 Living in USA

1.0 with the exact same answers in Ethiopia

[starfury]

IN COMPARISON, THE AVERAGE ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT IN YOUR COUNTRY IS 24 ACRES PER PERSON.

WORLDWIDE, THERE EXIST 4.5 BIOLOGICALLY PRODUCTIVE ACRES PER PERSON.

IF EVERYONE LIVED LIKE YOU, WE WOULD NEED 3.6 PLANETS

[Civil War Man]

2.5 Living in USA

1.0 with the exact same answers in Ethiopia

Which would indicate a "USA=3v1l, gl0b4l1z4t10n=t3h sux" bias common among idiots who give environmentalism a bad name.

I tested it myself. Gave the worst, most environment-hating answers possible. 4.9 for Banglidesh, 7.7 for Ethiopia, 7.7 for Japan, 8.4 for Poland, 11.6 for England, 12.3 for Australia, 12.7 for Saudi Arabia, 13.3 for China, 17.8 for USA.

I never would have imagined that where someone lives would make their personal habits so much more destructive than the identical personal habits of someone who lives somewhere else. With a few notable exceptions, it seems the more in the First World you are located, the more harmful this site will rank your actions.

I'll have to reiterate my statement that this is largely trying to guilt-trip people, and that this bullshit will unfortunately bite legitimate environmentalism in the ass as well.

[RRoan]

Which would indicate a "USA=3v1l, gl0b4l1z4t10n=t3h sux" bias common among idiots who give environmentalism a bad name.

I tested it myself. Gave the worst, most environment-hating answers possible. 4.9 for Banglidesh, 7.7 for Ethiopia, 7.7 for Japan, 8.4 for Poland, 11.6 for England, 12.3 for Australia, 12.7 for Saudi Arabia, 13.3 for China, 17.8 for USA.

I never would have imagined that where someone lives would make their personal habits so much more destructive than the identical personal habits of someone who lives somewhere else. With a few notable exceptions, it seems the more in the First World you are located, the more harmful this site will rank your actions.

I'll have to reiterate my statement that this is largely trying to guilt-trip people, and that this bullshit will unfortunately bite legitimate environmentalism in the ass as well.

You aren't trying hard enough. I can get 25.7 planets.

[tharkûn]

power's fine in places like San Diego, California, but wouldn't be nearly as effective in places more prone to overcast weather like, say, Syracuse, New York.

On another note with this point, I know that wind farms take up huge tracts of land in order to generate a decent amount of power. In terms of efficiency, how does it compare with other methods of power generation?

Where are you building it? In most places it is utter crap. Power generation scales with the cube of wind speed so a 50% reduction results in an 8 fold decrease in power generation (conversely doubling your average wind speed - say a few hills in the Rockies makes it ludicriously efficient). The big problem is that wind is chaotic and periodic, in order to get real energy from wind you'd need to build so much buffer capacity into the system I doubt it would be worth the bother outside of a few extremely atypical hotspots.

Solar power's fine in places like San Diego, California, but wouldn't be nearly as effective in places more prone to overcast weather like, say, Syracuse, New York.

One word:
Snow. At my old house between 3 and 5 months of the year any solar would have been buried and useless.

and aren't a lot of environmentalists railing against hydroelectric power because it requires damming up rivers?

If you noticed they copped out and talked up only "small scale" hydoelectric. The truth is hydro dicks over river temperature, water velocity, and actually emits methane (lake retreats in dry spell, plants grow, water rises back up, plants decompose anaerobicly). Depending on how they define "small scale" this either a major issue, or they have made the plants so ridiciously small that you can't hope to get anything close to current hydogeneration.

I never would have imagined that where someone lives would make their personal habits so much more destructive than the identical personal habits of someone who lives somewhere else. With a few notable exceptions, it seems the more in the First World you are located, the more harmful this site will rank your actions.

Yes and no. Yes if you live in Toronto you are going to have to consume more energy than if you live in Athens; heating requirements have a significant impact on energy consumption. Likewise if you consume energy from the Chinese coal-fired grid you are going to have a different impact than if you consume it off the French nuclear grid.

That being said the variance is WAY too bloody high for those types of factors.

[Dooey Jo]

The test probably doesn't account for the fact that bus's carry multiple people, and instead looks only at its poor mpg.

Isn't that quite a bit misleading? Those buses are almost always crammed with people so the mpg per person must be a lot lower than it would have been had everyone taken their cars (assuming mpg means miles per gallon. That is correct, right?). Besides, most of the buses here run on ethanol and "bio gas" (they smell like shit. Literary. Not that petrol exhausts smells good, but goddamn!).

[Eleas]

Isn't that quite a bit misleading? Those buses are almost always crammed with people so the mpg per person must be a lot lower than it would have been had everyone taken their cars (assuming mpg means miles per gallon. That is correct, right?). Besides, most of the buses here run on ethanol and "bio gas" (they smell like shit. Literary. Not that petrol exhausts smells good, but goddamn!).

Of course it's misleading. It's a one-minute click test with an agenda.

[Darth Wong]

I never would have imagined that where someone lives would make their personal habits so much more destructive than the identical personal habits of someone who lives somewhere else.

That's not entirely unreasonable. When I wake up in the morning, turn on the halogen lights which I use because they make that nice tone, take a shower, go to the bathroom, and turn on my computer to check my E-mail, I've probably already used up more water and electricity than someone in Ethiopia would consume all day. In other words, baseline consumption in North America is much higher than it is in Ethiopia.

Similarly, my idea of eating meat is probably considerably more generous than an Ethiopian's idea of eating meat. The amount of meat that the average North American consumes in a few days could sustain people like that for a month. I've spoken to people from poorer nations who come here and are utterly amazed at how much meat we North Americans can eat in a single meal.

But I suppose it's easier to dismiss that discrepancy as "OMG st00p1d liberalz lolololol!!!", isn't it?

PS. 4.1 planets for me. 3.5 of those planets are due to the fact that I eat meat or dairy on a daily basis. That answer may have been in error since I'm counting fish as meat and I'm not sure I'm supposed to for the purposes of that question.

[Darth Servo]

CATEGORY ACRES
FOOD 5.4
MOBILITY 0.7
SHELTER 1.7
GOODS/SERVICES 1.7
TOTAL FOOTPRINT 10

IN COMPARISON, THE AVERAGE ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT IN YOUR COUNTRY IS 24 ACRES PER PERSON.

WORLDWIDE, THERE EXIST 4.5 BIOLOGICALLY PRODUCTIVE ACRES PER PERSON.

IF EVERYONE LIVED LIKE YOU, WE WOULD NEED 2.2 PLANETS.

Mostly because I have a highly fuel efficient car and rarely use it, walking, public transportation or cycling where ever I go.

[Bounty]

1.4 planets, thanks to public transportation and lots of homegrown food.

[Plekhanov]

1.5 planets mainly because I’m a vegetarian cyclist who does everything they can to avoid the internal combustion engine.

[Darth Wong]

Of course, there is one particular parameter of this quiz which is heavily and unfairly biased against westerners, and I'm surprised that none of the knee-jerk conservatives have picked up on it (that's the problem with being a knee-jerker; you can't see clearly past your own jerking knees).

The test says "if everyone lived the way you do", while ignoring the fact that one of the key parameters of the western lifestyle is population control. In short, if everyone lived the way we do in the west, there would be a helluva lot fewer people in the world, so we would not need that many planets in order to handle our needs. Overpopulation is a huge environmental problem which they completely ignore in their test.

That aspect of the test could be fixed by asking "how many siblings do you have" for young people and "how many children do you have or plan to have" for older people, and then applying a correction factor to the global population based on your answer.

[Mr. Coffee]

Wow... 25.6 planets. HIGH SCORE! Does this mean I win a prize or something for being a complete bastard to the planet or something?

[darthdavid]

Wow... 25.6 planets. HIGH SCORE! Does this mean I win a prize or something for being a complete bastard to the planet or something?

I'll take you out whaling so we can raise both of our scores. I'm having orca burgers tonight.

[wilfulton]

Hmmm, I need 7.9 planets for how I live, and 4.4 planets for how I live when I go back to visit my parents in rural Idaho.

I'll split the difference and say I need 35 planets to live on. Shit, I better start building my armada. We've got some conquering to do!

[Mr. Coffee]

Wow... 25.6 planets. HIGH SCORE! Does this mean I win a prize or something for being a complete bastard to the planet or something?

I'll take you out whaling so we can raise both of our scores. I'm having orca burgers tonight.

Sounds like a plan, I'll bring the beer. Think we can stop and club some seal pups while were out?

[bilateralrope]

for me i got 2.4 planets, or when i said i had electricty with energy efficeicy (because i wasn't sure) without changing anything else, it also said 2.4 planets

[Pick]

4.1 planets.

This is heavily skewed because I used my schoolyear miles-per-week count instead of summer's (because summer vacation is just that, a vacation from the norm.) I drive about 340 miles during an average schoolweek just commuting, because my school is so far away.

[Mange]

2.7 planets:

FOOD 2
MOBILITY 0.1
SHELTER 1.2
GOODS/SERVICES 1.5
TOTAL FOOTPRINT 4.8

IN COMPARISON, THE AVERAGE ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT IN YOUR COUNTRY IS 6.7 GLOBAL HECTARES PER PERSON.

WORLDWIDE, THERE EXIST 1.8 BIOLOGICALLY PRODUCTIVE GLOBAL HECTARES PER PERSON.

IF EVERYONE LIVED LIKE YOU, WE WOULD NEED 2.7 PLANETS.

Important to note. I don't own a car and one of the questions was how many liters/100 km your car consumes without the option "I don't own a car".

[Ford Prefect]

You're looking at a guy who needs five planets to support six billion or so people who lived just like me.

[Mr Bean]

I call supreme BS on this test

CATEGORY ACRES
FOOD 4.2
MOBILITY 0.2
SHELTER 1.5
GOODS/SERVICES 1.5
TOTAL FOOTPRINT 7


IF EVERYONE LIVED LIKE YOU, WE WOULD NEED 1.7 PLANETS

Ok, I walk everywhere, my entire world exists in a land area around eighteen square kms. I eat meat once a week.
Nevermind that FISH are MEAT
I use electricity, live in a aparment complex as large as most houses but many stories, have less than 500 square feet of room.

Basicly EVERY single lowest possiple answear, all of it true thanks to my location.

And yet I still need 1.7 planets. Its not even TRYING to play fair.

[Sharp-kun]

2.4 planets