Guest Speaker: Joe Medeiros

Global warming and the mulitple ailments of the environment make headlines every day. By investing your future into sustainable careers, not only does it ensure that your job will be needed and be keeping up with the times but you'll be helping to turn our global environmental situation around--as everyday work! When I was growing up and even still I have impossible expectations of myself to make a huge difference for the world and the environment but then I get dissapointed when the rest of my life gets in the way. Joe opened my eyes to realize that you can adapt essentially any career path to be more sustainable. If your an artist, you can use your skills to work and develop campaigns for sustainability or for new more sustainable company practices to be advertised. If your an outdoorsmen, you can work outside and take data on the environment and the climate. Business people can adapt their businesses to be more efficient and produce less waste; for example, my sister is a dental hygienist and they throw away alot of plastic on a day to day basis...which isn't biodegradable. If they used cloth on the chairs rather than throwing away plastic for each patient, they would just have a really big load of laundry but wouldn't be filling landfills. I love the idea that you can adapt sustainability into any career path and into everyday life. On campus we've started integrating online and on ground classes to be paperless... which saves alot of resources of trees over the semester. Sustainable careers are the future, and they need to be. It is just so exciting to me that we really can make a difference in any situation we're in. If we are all careful to do so, it will make a large difference!

Guest Speaker: Gary Liss

Gary Liss talked to our class today about zero waste. It was an interesting and new concept to me... in order to be considered as producing zero waste you have to have 97% clean, recycled, non-producing waste. Its interesting to think about because even recycling plastics produces waste and uses energy in the recycling process, so how do we achieve zero waste? The most alarming yet unsurprising thing I learned was that landfills are the number one largest source of greenhouse gases, over our cars and factories.... it is our trash that continues to trash and harm the environment. It was really interesting to hear about companies that produce zero waste, like this carpet company that just uses squares that are free of glues and all the toxic stuff---and they recycle their own carpet rather than having it go to a landfill. Gary talked about how in order to have zero waste, people and companies must practice more than just reduce, reuse, recycle, but also practice refuse and return. There is no pressure like consumer pressure, companies will respond if you won't accept their product and its practices. It wasn't surprising that San Francisco and Santa Cruz are zero waste cities because they are typically on the verge of environmental revolutions. It was really awesome to learn of how many cities have already achieved zero waste. It is awesome because it shows the rest of the world that it is possible. We just have to change our thinking from a merely recycle concept, to include more sustainable practices and seek our companies that abide by our standards of non-polluting operations. The stage has been set and we've seen that its possible, now the public just has to act. Its an awesome concept and we shouldn't and don't have the time to wait any longer.

My Feelings About Earth Day

Earth Day is nice for a friendly reminder to help do your part in keeping the Earth healthy. It not only reminds us to turn off our lights but it also gives us a day to learn more about the things we can do to help be more sustainable and reduce our carbon footprint. Not to mention, it is a day of celebration for the amazing things, creatures, and places that are on this earth and helps to remind us that the earth is more than just humans going to work and school and coming home every day. What we do directly affects the planet we live on. If I make two trips to the store a week, rather than planning in advance and making a single trip a week, I'm wasting my money-- as well as releasing more CO2 into the air from my extra driving and wasting our limited fossil fuels. Although I recognize Earth Day as a time of celebrating all living things on earth and a time to help wake people up again to restart or adopt new habits to be more eco-friendly, I have mixed feelings about an Earth Day. I like the idea of waking people up to remind them that they directly affect everything on earth in the decisions they make; however, I do not believe that it should only be once a year. It makes me sad that we have an excuse once a year to wake up, when the world needs us to be aware of its needs everyday. We become so busy, but we can't afford to do something good for the Earth one week out of the year. I do feel that it is important in bringing about new information and reminding people to do their part though... without any reminders and awareness, many people would not think anything about their bad habits. Earth Day has only been around for 40 years or so and should continue to be around as long as earth is around, but people should act more like every day is earth day in their habits.

Guest Speaker: Joe Medeiros (ANWR)

I've always been against drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge; however, I've never actually had the knowledge of why to back up my argument. Before we listened to Joe's podcast on ANWR from last semester I didn't want them to drill in ANWR because it was a pristine wildlife refuge--true wilderness, and because i knew deep down that it would cause more harm than just displacing the caribou a little bit. I knew that it had hazards such as accidents that would spill oil and damage the surrounding wilderness. Also, i wondered about the potential air pollution that would occur in the process of extracting oil. Although I wasn't far off in my thinking, Joe Medeiros put it into perspective. ANWR is 19.5 million acres, also including 8 million acres of wilderness. The drilling project would take 375 acres of this land. They argue that its not much land to take; however, there is a large danger for spills and ugly tunnels connecting everything. It is too much of a danger to risk all of the migratory species that come there. It is amazing land to risk, 0 alien species. This is all crazy! If ANWR was our sole source of oil, we would only get enough oil to last us 9-12 months after the ten years it'd take to build!!! This is ridiculous that we even consider this risk! Instead, we should invest in alternative energy sources... and not risk an entire ecosystem.

Guest Speaker: Ray Darby

Ray Darby's talk was very insightful in how a person can save money and energy, all around living more "green". He brought up the fact that people don't think about transportation enough. They may live in a more energy efficient home, but if they're driving a hummer, they kinda cancel each other out. Also however, is transportation in regards to our food. If our food we buy is imported from across the country, or even from another country, it took alot of energy to get it to you. It took energy in storing it, fuel and oil to transport it by plane maybe and then by truck, not to mention the gasoline it took you to drive to the store where its at and back home. We need to start thinking about these things because they can make a big difference. If we buy locally grown food, it took less resources to make and is more sustainable. Also, buying lower on the food chain can make a big difference because it takes alot more resources to raise a cow than just eating the grass or vegetables directly. Another thing is considering a short term loss for a long term gain when building a house/thinking of getting solar panels and other more energy efficient remodelings...they save in the long run. In his own home, Ray Darby did simple things such as just not placing very many windows facing the south, where the sun will hit and absorb energy throughout the majority of the day. This reduces air conditioning costs without costing a cent more. Ray Darby provided us with simple things to consider about everyday life to significantly decrease our ecological footprint.

My Viewpoint on the Environment

Although I've had environmental classes before, they were more technical: inversion layer this, the coriolis affect that. While they were effective in teaching me about how the world works, and how important it is to keep our world working the way it should, they were so gloom and doom in the way they were taught that I always left class feeling like there was no hope. Over the semester, while i may have learned some more technicalities, i've learned realistic approaches to bringing about the change that we need. In this sense, this class has dramatically changed my viewpoint on the environment throughout the semester. I get so frustrated and feel so helpless about how to fix all of the problems that we've caused for ourselves and this world, and with the guest speakers and Keely, i've learned that every little thing adds up. This class has really helped to put into perspective how i directly affect my environment. Not just by how often and how far i drive my car, but by what i buy, if i unplug my cell phone charger, if i dump oil down the drain. While all of the little things can add up to help save our environment, I realize how it can all add up to harm it as well. Now when i'm washing cars, i think about where the soap is going to go, I already knew that soap in our water ways could cause great problems like eutrophication, but this class is bringing me and my affect on the environment full circle. I alone can both help or harm my environment, and it is up to me to decide which i'd rather do.

Guest Speaker: Laird Thompson

Today in class, Laird Thomspon came to talk to us about Oil- A History and a Future. It was really interesting because he presented us with facts that the common person doesn't know or ever think about oil. He had a good overall point in his lecture, since we as a society are so disconnected from oil, since 2/3 of our oil is imported from other countries, we don't think about how wasteful using this resource as our main source for fuel is. At the very best, 60-70 percent of oil is recovered from an oil well; however, most cases are only as good as 10-15 percent. As expensive and extensive the damage is when oiling, 10-15 percent is a small percentage to actually get from what is there. If we think about it, it has become such a limited resource, that we are extremely dependent upon, and we can only extract 50 percent, at best, of the oil thats actually there. There are alot of dangers and accidents associated with oil and extracting it but we aren't as aware because it doesnt occur in our country as much. Blowouts cause fires and can create lakes of oil that are extremely damaging to the surrounding environment. Laird Thompson talked about how in the '70's we imported only one third of our oil, and now we import two thirds forty years later. We are definitely an overconsuming and heavily dependent society on oil... in the U.S. in 2005, we used 21,930,000 barrels of oil a day. Laird talked about ways that we can reduce some of our oil consumption though... by using synthetic oil in our cars, it lasts longer by almost 10 times that of normal oil! Which is an incentive for people to use because you save money. Overall, it was really interesting to learn about something i use everyday but rarely think about. Its eye opening, I worry about the limited resource and the rate at which we consume it, but i think nothing about where it comes from. That isnt the way to bring about change. If oil runs out, what is our future?

Guest Speaker: Joe Medeiros

Joe Medeiros came to class to talk to us about sustainable careers. Starting off by giving us facts about the world and sustainability. These facts were alarming, if we dont start practicing sustainability, we will continue on this crash course of destruction. Joe told us that each day, 250,000 people are added to the world, 116 square miles of rainforest is destroyed, 15 million T of carbon is added to the atmosphere through excessive burning of fossil fuels, and 50 to 100 species will go extinct! This is not okay! The reason for all of this destruction is due to anthropogenic influence on the world and through us not practicing sustainability. We consume more than can be reproduced. Joe talked about how we not only need to practice sustainability in our environment, but also in our society and our economy [the three p's: people, planet, profit]. Our environment provides us with numerous ecosystem services that we need in order to survive on this planet. So not only are we destroying our planet, but we are also destroying the future of our species. Earth Day was first practiced on April 22, 1970, however even 40 years later with all the knowledge we have about our negative affects on our planet, we do not treat every day like it is Earth Day, as we should. With all of the processes we have begun that cannot be reversed, there are even more processes that can be stopped before they get worse. We need to practice sustainability globally to stop the overconsumption of our planet's resources and to stop global warming. With all of this work that is required to reverse the affects of our ignorance, the future lies in sustainable careers. Green energy/alternative power, such as windmills, water, and possibly nuclear power are our future. Also, changing company's practices to be more ecologically friendly by reducing their wastes involved in production. Our future is in sustainable careers, and it is necessary to try to save our planet.

Guest Speaker: Frank DeCoulter

Frank DeCoulter came to class today to talk to us about Global Warmings Impact on California and the world in general. It was really interesting to see the predictions thatwere modeled for the earth's temperatures in just the next 100 years. Although it was interesting, it was extremely alarming because some of these models showed a potential ten degrees farenheit rise in california's average temperature in the next short period of time. This is crazy in comparison to the degree celcius on average that the Earth has rised in temperature overall in the last couple centuries. With only one degree celcius in change, we are seeing drastic repercussions, i can't imagine the repercussions of even five to ten degrees. People don't pay any mind to this... 1 degree, big whoop, right? But its one degree overall average temperature. With this one degree, we are losing 3 times as much ice in the summer as we're gaining in the winter in Greenland, which is just an example of the overall effects. Now water is flowing 8 months out of the year instead of for a short period in the short arctic spring and summer. It was interesting to find out that the warming is unevenly distributed. The Northern Hemisphere warms faster because the north pole is all ocean, no land, and when it is unfrozen, the dark ocean absorbs heat versus the white antarctic ice reflecting light. Also, in the northern hemisphere, theres permafrost that when it melts, releases methane, accelerating warming. This warming is scary. We need to take action, starting with the simple things. We cannot keep up what we're doing... we're releasing fossil fuels into our environment at a rate thats 60,000 times greater than the rate of formation!!! No wonder our environment is warming! As Amory Lovins says, "...humanity has exactly enough time, starting now." We have warning, we've seen the signs, now we need to act to keep our future from reaching or exceeding the scary predictions.

Guest Speaker: Jane Haproff

Today in class, our guest speaker Jane Haproff discussed with us the ties between religion and our environment. She highlighted several of the main religions roots and views of the environment. Some religions, such as Hinduism, revere life in any form. In these religions, they feel that all life is ensouled with the "gods". Thus, people who practice this religion have a very sacred view of nature, and live more as equals with nature than trying to dominate it. Christianity on the other hand views the material world as a place of suffering to be escaped from, Heaven being our true home. In this religion, humans are greater in hierarchy than other organisms in nature. These differing roots of religion help us define how we look at and treat the environment. Different religions view our roles as humans in the world differently. Some religions view our role to be dominate over the environment. Whereas others view our purpose to be stewards of the land, needing to cultivate and care for it. Although all of the religions differ in one way or another, the way we treat our environment and view its meaning can be found in a society's religious roots.

Guest Speaker: Lynn Medeiros

Lynn Medeiros spoke to us about constructing arguments. She discussed the criteria that are needed to make an argument of value: truth, relevance, and support. We need these components because the purpose of an argument is to make people think and see evidence that supports your argument, to persuade them. She discussed the importance of a relevant argument, based on factual evidence rather than emotion. Just as we've discussed in class, an argument to stop global warming by showing the cute polar bears that are sad cuz they're losing their home is not a good argument, it is an emotional plea. By including factual evidence into our arguments, it gives an argument backing. It helps to gain support by those who do not necessarily have the same background beliefs and views about the world, but when they see and think about the evidence for your argument, they draw their own conclusion. The conclusion that they draw is not because it appeals to their emotions, but because the facts lean or don't lean in support of the point they draw. Lynn Medeiros really had good points about factual arguments versus emotional arguments, and staying consistent in your beliefs.

Environmental History

My view of the environment has transformed from when i was a kid. Growing up, I would go camping or hiking on occasion, but i was always outside. I would play in the backyard or just throughout the neighborhood, I loved it. But as a kid i didn't truly realize why i loved it. I was playing and having fun but i didn't recognize it as just a pure appreciation for nature. My parents had a garden and some fruit trees that we were always tending to, and a compost pile that stunk in the summer. Although it was nature in my very backyard, it was a chore for me. As i grew up, i took interest in more environmental classes and learning about the environment. The more i learned, the more it became special to me. I would spend hours in front of the t.v. and sometimes still do, watching shows about different animals, or different places in nature. It is so exciting to me. I can't get the same feeling i do when i'm standing in a place of nature thinking about how its so big and how it all works together in this grand way anywhere else. Taking environmental science classes would leave me mad, thinking about how we don't take care of where we live and we try to work against it, rather than live in harmony with nature. I don't believe that humans are superior to any other species, and that nature has a greater purpose than to serve one minute species out of the millions that exist. At heart, i'd like to be a preservationist, i don't like messing with nature the way that we do; however, in actuality, i'm a conservationist. We need to use resources from the Earth for our survival, but in return we should use sustainably. I'm content with my viewpoint as a conservationist, i have developed these views throughout my life and my experiences, but i would like to change to act more in sync with my beliefs. I want to do more of the little things, the "green" things, to help make a difference in the health and continued existance of nature and the Earth.

Guest Speaker: Vernon Martin

The idea that Vernon Martin presented was really unique... i'm still trying to fully grasp the concept. It was interesting to look at the environment from a more philosophical standpoint, rather than the facts. Martin spoke of the idea of "finding nature at the mall"... the idea that we have become so disconnected from nature that our way of showing we appreciate it and that we care about it is by consuming it. We buy small knick knacks taken from nature: petrified wood, rocks, bat boxes, et cetera; however, in this process of showing that we appreciate nature by surrounding ourselves with it, we are so disconnected from true nature that we do not think about the detrimental costs to nature by removing these items from the natural world to purchase. Its really interesting, this idea that we don't just see things as 1-dimensional, but we give them meaning. This meaning that we give things is so strong that we distance ourselves into seeing the artificial versions of things as more real than the natural. It is a big thing that occurs today in marketing. Businesses appeal to making people feel connected to nature and feel as they're doing good by intentionally building places like rainforest cafe, where there are safari animals and where things aren't the way they are in real life; however, a part of their proceeds help in environmental conservation... appealing to the public. What the public doesn't know is what damages to the environment occured to make that restaurant. Vernon Martin was a very interesting speaker and had an interesting topic, we really do see the map as more real than the territory these days.

Guest Speaker: Joe Medeiros

Joe Medeiros came to class and spoke to us about the importance of biodiversity. It was really interesting to discover that biodiversity has three different aspects: cellular level, species level, and ecosystem level. These three elements combine to encompass "life's diversity". Mammals are the smallest group in number of different species, containing 4500 different species, compared to the insect group, containing 963,000 different species. 40 percent of these insects are beetles. Scientists estimate that there are 1 million billion ants on this earth, equaling the amount of flesh of the amount of humans on this earth. Those pesky ants that I'm always killing in my house actually have a purpose that i never knew about--more than just bothering people. They sustain ecosystems by turning and fertilizing the soil, all throughout the world. I realize that our entire life is 100 percent dependent on species, but thats crazy to truly think about. 100 percent dependent. I knew that the tropical rainforest has the highest amount of biodiversity, but I didn't know until today that it regulates the global atmosphere by regulating wind, temperature, and global rainfall. We benefit from having biodiversity in every way, but specifically due to the ecosystem services provided to us. For example, having trees around a city helps decrease erosion, it holds water, it increases the oxygen supply for the population and it stores carbon, decreasing atmospheric carbon levels that lead to global warming. Biodiversity doesnt just save a polar bear, it saves our own lives as well.

Toxins and Me!

The fact that there are toxins in our environment is a familiar topic to me, and if you've ever read Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, she'll beat you over the head with the idea; however, there's a difference between reading a technical book that gives you so many details and measurements that you lose the big picture, and just thinking and talking about toxins in our environment. Its crazy to think about, they're literally everywhere! I really care that there are so many toxins that I can't even go to the river and pull out a fish and know that i'm safe in eating it. Our community is dealing with the repercussions of mining waste from the beginnings of the Gold Rush. That's over 150 years of heavy toxins leaching into our environment; however, they're getting into our environment more than they should be because mining waste has not been properly cleaned up. There are still open mines and acid mine drainage into our rivers, not to mention all of the rock waste that we crush up and re-use -- releasing even more toxins (asbestos) than we need to in our environment. I definitely think that we should clean these toxins, their biomagnification just endangers us even more the longer we go without cleaning them up. Its becoming a bigger problem than it needs to be because we're ignorant and lazy. Unfortunately in our society, things have to be toxic to the point that they have very dangerous affects before we take notice and act upon them, in an ideal world, we'd take care of things right away; however, alot of times we sadly don't know things are too toxic until they have negative repercussions. Cleaning up these toxic mine wastes, we can store it in big drums deep in the mountains, like they do with nuclear waste. This is expensive, however, do the costs outweigh the health and environmental benefits? The abandoned mines should be reinforced so that they don't cave in--whether this is practical or not i'm not sure--but it would reduce the yearly accidents and cave ins. We can avoid adding more toxins to our environment by being more aware of the simple things-- re-using containers rather than using ziploc bags and all the toxins used to make plastics. We need to educate ourselves, all of us, and slowly as we all become aware of doing the little things to reduce toxins in our environment, we can make bigger strides.

Guest Speaker: Mike Thornton

Mike Thornton's lecture on the toxic legacy of gold mining was very informative. It has left dangerous chemicals throughout the Sierra Nevada region that's presence is predominately unknown by the average citizen. It was amazing to me, the example of the elementary school in El Dorado Hills that had been built on mine tailings is exposing children to asbestos on a daily basis. When these chemicals are left in the rocks in which they naturally occur, there is no harm or danger to the environment; however, with mining, these rocks are ground into a flour-like substance to extract as much gold as possible--releasing these chemicals into the atmospher, leaching into the ground, and contaminating our waterways. There are other poisons that mining has left in abundance contaminating the environments of the Sierra region: mercury, arsenic, and lead are also dangerous chemicals leftover from mining and the Gold Rush.

These chemicals are extremely dangerous as they can cause birth defects, cancers, lung disease, skin conditions, and developmental disorders. It is amazing that the gold rush, having occured more than 150 years ago has left such a long lasting issue to the Sierra environment. The poison i find of particular danger and the hot topic for news stories within the last few years is mercury. Mercury is in our waterways at unhealthily high levels. It has prevented the native peoples of the land from performing ritualistic ceremonies with salmon, since they're too dangerous to eat, and the reeds they use for basket weaving are too dangerous to put into their mouth. Also, the dangers of mercury, particularly at the human level, are that mercury biomagnifies. As it goes through the food chain, all the way from the producer to the tertiary consumer (humans), there are increased levels of mercury contaminating the tissues of the organisms; therefore, becoming more and more dangerous for human consumption. Thornton said that 26 million pounds of mercury was brought to the Sierra for mining, and only 50% of it was re-used. That means...13 MILLION POUNDS IS STILL LEFT IN OUR ENVIRONMENT!!! This is a huge problem!

Thornton provided alot of interesting information about mining that i never knew before. Miners re-routed 5,000 miles of riverin the sierra to get rid of the waste, which flooded farmland and waterways all the way to San Francisco Bay. Thats a huge amount of river, which, in re-routing it, was probably more contaminated. Apparently this later became PG&E's hydro-electric system. He highlighted the impacts of these actions and the toxins that were released into the environment and spread his awareness, which is what we will need in order to take action and get these toxins cleaned up.

Guest Speaker: Gary Noy

Wow! It was so interesting to learn about the Sierra Nevada. I never knew that the foothills and starting at Sacramento were considered a part of the Sierra Nevada. Its such a large span of climate for an environment. From 300 feet above sea level to thousands of feet in altitude. The Sierra Nevada have such a history-- the beginning of skiing started there. I never knew that 2/3 of all California water is from the Sierra Nevada. Thats alot of water for a largely populated state! The diversity of the environment of the Sierra Nevada was really interesting to me...but for a 600 million year old mountain range, its had time to gain diversity.

It was really interesting to learn that a lake i've been to many times now is over 3 earthquake faults and that a tidal wave that will drain the lake a move its debris will happen again in time. Incline Village, a beautiful place to visit was named after the incline that they would put logs on to transport over the mountain during the Gold Rush and the days of timbering. The idea of tahoe not being a virgin forest and being so thin because of the amount of mining that used to occur in that region is shocking to me--the trees are so thick and full it is amazing that they weren't always there. I've lived in the area my entire life and never knew these things. I have taken environmental science classes before and learned about the negative affects of mining on the environment and its fouling of water sources, but I never really learned about what hydraulic mining was. Its interesting seeing as there were so many hydraulic mine locations in the Sierra Nevada area.

The time flew by as Gary Noy was speaking about the human influence on Sierra Nevada environment, and although he only spoke for about an hour, I learned things i've never learned before living here my whole life. He was very knowlegeable on the subject and brought my attention to things i never knew about before.

Species Conservation

Choosing the species that we need to conserve is a difficult and almost impossible task, as the Planet Earth episode talked about, we never truly know how important a species is until they are gone. The tiny bugs and critters in our dirt complete important tasks that we may not know about until they are gone. This goes the same for larger species of mammals-- if a species is wiped out, it will disturb the balance of that ecosystem drastically. We must do our best to evaluate the different functions of individual species to assess which species are most important to each ecosystem-- hopefully the idea of hotspots works out (spending money on conserving one species affects and alternately conserves all in an ecosystem). Although the value of a particular species is impossible to determine, the species that has the biggest influence on the ecosystem is most valuable in species conservation to save.

Unfortunately, the species that we tend to conserve are the large, fuzzy, cute mammals because they appeal emotionally to the public and thus gain more support. Wildlife conservation groups also play into this trend because they need financial support and backing, and they realize that they need to appeal to what the public will actually listen to--the sadness of a polar bear drowning from exhaustion in search for food. Consequently, the important bugs and worms and amphibians in our ecosystems, or the plants that are necessary for certain ecosystems to function properly and survive are gone ignored. These are the species that need conserving the most, as they typically have a larger niche than that of the polar bears or panda bears. These are the species that feed and affect many other species of that particular ecosystem by being an important plant or by decomposing the rubbish on the forest floors into fertile soil for more food to grow.

I'm a firm believer in the idea that everything happens for a reason, but at the same time, I know that the rapid and increasing decline in practically all species across the world is much more than just being a natural part of that species evolutionary process--this is because humans have taken over the world, quite literally. There are particular cultures that are born and raised believing that they need to repopulate the world, with these outdated mindsets, we are causing serious problems with overpopulation. Not only have we expanded into and destroyed the greater majority of pristine nature/wilderness to make room for houses or for materials to build houses, but then there are people living in America averaging a carbon footprint of 6.5 earths as a nation--because we can. The decline of species is undoubtedly human induced.

Introduced species always cause problems because they are above the niche of the ecosystem, have no natural predators, and their prey are not adapted to survive against them--I believe that we should eradicate introduced species because they threaten the survival of entire ecosystems. The only reason an introduced species should be conserved is if it has lived in that ecosystem long enough to have established a niche and is not overpowering and threatening the ecosystem's survival; however, I cannot think of any circumstances like this.

Balancing the needs of humans with the needs of wildlife becomes a tricky topic, particularly when dealing with the survival of a starving family versus the survival of a rare and expensive animal/an opportunity for dinner. We must do our best as humans now to be aware to not overpopulate--only replace ourselves when having children. If we have the means, to live as green as we can. To be aware not to bring over foreign species to an area where it will take over and threaten the ecosystems. We all just need to open our eyes and minds to do what we can to work side by side with wildlife.

My Ecological footprint

6.07 Earths!!! If everyone lived like me we would need 6.07 earths to sustain everyone. I knew that my footprint was going to be large but that was absolutely shocking. I really care that my footprint is so huge because it is the people like me that are aware of global warming, but that at the same time still require 6 earths to support everyone if they were to live like me. This quiz is really informative, and woke me up to how selfish I am-- I complain about the affects of global warming (my favorite lake is almost completely gone) and yet its the way i live that is the main cause of this.

To reduce my footprint, I can buy more organic and locally grown products, reducing the detrimental effects that shipping foods long distance has on the environment. Also, I take 20 minute showers, so it would be a dramatic difference even if i just cut my shower time in half. I'm the type of person who thinks of something they need and goes and buys it from the store, making lots of little trips, if i just waited and made a list of places to go while I'm out and make a big circle, I could dramatically reduce the amount of time I'm on the road--thus reducing my carbon emissions. Simple things like unplugging the coffee maker or the toaster really add up too. Lastly, if i began to be more aware of how much meat I actually consume in a week, I could cut back to just a few times a week to reduce the strain on the large areas of land it takes to support the growth of our meat supplies. Even just starting out slow and doing these simple steps will have a large impact on reducing my ecological footprint.

Having such a large footprint is unfair to every individual organism that lives on this Earth. Some people do not have as many luxuries in life such as clean running water and the choice of meat or pasta every day, but I do. This, however, causes me to be selfish and neglectful to doing my part to keep the world a sustainable place for generations to come. This is not fair to those living in other countries that can barely get access to the things they need for survival on a daily basis, not to mention the long term affects that living like this will have in the future. People living like me are causing countries that barely even have a footprint to suffer because they have to deal with the long term affects that we make by having such large footprints. Rising temperatures on Earth mean that more places will be unbearably and deathly hot, also lowering crop's ability to grow. Decreasing trees, algae, and plankton will cause the carbon levels to rise even more and oxygen levels on the planet to decrease--affecting all life. Water supply will decrease as the land becomes more naturally barren, altering local climates. If we, as such a high ecological footprint country, keep taking in resources at this rate we will leave nothing for other countries.

This is not just America's fault, but we are high contributors to this problem. As humans all sharing a planet together, we must be more aware of the problem we have created and we must all work together to reduce our footprint and to save the future of all Earth's species and the Earth itself.