How Much Carbon Dioxide You Are Producing

It has been estimated by environmental experts that the latest world tour of Madonna has released 1635 tons of carbon dioxide. And it is reported that an actress in China has spent much money in planting recently because the airplanes she took in 2008 had release about 20 tons of waste gas. Human activities are energy-consuming. We have to admit that no matter what we are doing, we are producing carbon dioxide. Then how much carbon dioxide are we producing? We are not celebrities and no expert would calculate it for us. But we can calculate by ourselves.

The calculation does not need an expert but only a carbon calculator. It can help us calculate the amount of carbon dioxide that we are producing through eating, drinking and even sleeping. For example the amount released by an electronic appliance is 0.785 multiplied by the consumed electricity. And that of a car equals to 2.7 times of the amount of petrol. Is it still confusing? Let us take a simple example. When an air-conditioner works in summer, it costs 1.5 degrees of electricity. Then it releases about 10 kilograms overnight. By the same method, we can figure out that transportations produce much more.   

If we are not good at math, we have another choice. It is practical to estimate the total amount according to the specific situation of house, population and transportation and environmental protection habits. For instance, suppose three members of our family live in a small house. We all use public transportations and we are economical. Then our family devotes about two tons of carbon dioxide every year. The average of Chinese families is 2.7 tons, while an American family usually releases about 20 tons.

There are some ways to reduce the release. For example, most people can choose not to drive a car. A shower instead of a bath is suggested. We must strengthen the awareness that releasing carbon dioxide should start from our ordinary life. First of all, we had better to use less energy-consuming products. For example, a bottle of 1.5 liters is far more economical than three bottles of 500 milliliters. And a piece of paper could use at least two times. Secondly, we could plants some trees if possible. Trees are capable of absorbing carbon dioxide. But every 100 degrees of electricity need one tree. In addition, WWF provides four environmental protection websites for us to buy the license of releasing. One of them is called Climate Friendly. Of course, there are many other methods, too.

The Earth is our home. We have to protect it every minute. Maybe in ten years, our life is all about environmental protection. The energy is from the sun. The mobile phone is telling us the releasing of carbon dioxide every week.