How many Earths would you need?

– 22 April , 2011Posted in: Environmental

I hate posting things for “Earth Day” because everyday should be earth day, but what an eye opener this was.

I thought I was doing well, but I am not doing near enough.

This site called: Ecological Footprint takes you through a survey (and with tons of helpful links on why they’re asking you certain questions) to determine how many Earths you’d need if everyone lived like you did.

You don’t have to take it in English either, it’s also in French and a few other languages.

It almost makes me want to have a home so I can implement changes like a greywater recycling system, or being able to grow a full garden.

As for food, I do find myself moving more towards vegetarian/vegan meals, so that’s a big improvement over all the meat I used to eat even 3 years ago.

I can’t beat myself up over this, but it makes me want to buckle and try harder to make the right choices all the time.

Thanks to Cassie for the link!

UPDATE: We re-took the test under the insistence of BF and got this new result:

But as I read the questions carefully, we realized a couple of things:

We couldn’t truthfully answer the furniture question because we only own a table, 2 chairs and a futon. :\
We live in hotels and cannot control low-flow toilets being installed and such
Living in hotels/downtown lets us walk a lot more than normal
I own a car, but in 3 years I’ve driven it about 8000 km in total which is a little over 2666 km a year
We don’t go to farmer’s markets as we’d have to drive to get there
We eat vegetarian 2-3 times a week, but not a “healthy” omnivore mix like we used to

Tags: Earth, Earth Day, Ecological Footprint, How many Earths do you need, Recycling, Usage, Utilities

About everydayminimalist

I'm a 20-something year old girl who lived out of a single suitcase in 2007, and now I'm living with less, but only with the best. You don't have to get rid of everything to become a minimalist! Minimalism can help simplify and organize your life, career, & physical surroundings. You can read more about me as a minimalist. Or come and visit my other blog Fabulously Broke in the City where I got out of $60,000 of debt in 18 months, earning $65,000 gross/year.

Cat

Oh wow, I was so surprised to get 0.94 :O
And I don’t even recycle anything except a bit of paper, am not vegan, use stuff with a lot of chemicals in them and so on… I have no idea how I could get such a low result by admitting all that. I don’t even have the electricity saving light bulbs. Like… how…? But I’m rather happy with my result. Maybe I should finally get those damn light bulbs.
Jason Farmer

I’m at 1.83 Earths, which I think will go down once I move to my next apartment (same uncontrollable building materials/already installed things) and start purchasing fully from the permanent Farmer’s market
-Josiah

3.22 earths. And only so little because I consider myself living in essentially a 1 bedroom apartment while living in a full house. If I had considered my roommates in my answers I know for a fact that it would have been greater.
As with my move that will be happening within the next few months I will definitely be cutting back on the things I don’t need. ie. using dryer to dry clothing, eating a healthier diet of more green, natural products, ect.

It’s sad how I, a single-fairly conscious young male, would wreak havoc on this planet if the population lived with me. It’s truly an eye opening quiz.
- http://www.everydayminimalist.com everydayminimalist
  
  That isn’t bad. I wonder what people have to do to get more than 3.22 Earths.
lynn sheldon

I got 1.44. I should be pretty pleased with that but I’m actually feeling bad because I know it’s about as low as it can be at the moment and is going to get higher. I don’t drive atm and everything is within walking distance so I rarely get public transport either.
But I’ll need to move & get a car and want to go on holiday more once I’m no longer studying.

It’s a bit depressing that we need more than one earth for everyone to live like me even though I’d consider my lifestyle fairly basic.

I found it a bit frustrating that the Qs were geared towards being a homeowner too and at the lack of details about energy usage but I guess they can’t tailor it to everyone.
- Anonymous
  
  I think if we can mentally subtract/adjust for what we feel makes up for
  what we don’t have (owning a home), it might be better.
  
  Perhaps you’re a 1.10 or 1.2..?
Caroline

Wow. 3.7 earths? And I consciously conserve. Only my food bar was almost as high as the US average. Of course, why does it make me feel better to be below average in the US, when the US is soooo wasteful. I’m trying to eat less…maybe I could offset my one roundtrip plane ride a year with all biking instead of the bus and train! Of course, some things I can’t control because I live in an apt, but it’s a small apt that I share
- Anonymous
  
  A constant struggle! I think after I donate my car to charity I’m going to
  try and live without one for work and so on.
Lacey

5.48 Earths. I think some of the travel may not have been right, but I need to cut down on something
- Anonymous
  
  Travel is one of those things I would find very hard to cut down on… even
  in my job, I travel a lot. But it sucks up a big carbon footprint.
http://diggingoutandup.blogspot.com Cassie

Thanks for the link
MelD

1.19… but not everything applies in my country, here a lot of things are automatic. I don’t have to worry about storm windows because 5-fold glazing is normal, for example. We laugh at the Brits still advertising double-glazed windows, how old-fashioned… and we aren’t vegetarian/vegan, either. The result is still too high though.
- Anonymous
  
  It is a lot easier if your country has those practices and policies in place
  for a long time.
  
  I find when I travel, I come back to North America and am apalled by our
  wastefulness as a whole. Constrained by such a lack of procedures in place,
  I’m also helpless and frustrated when I have my vegetable shavings and I
  want a garden to throw them into or a compost.
Laura

1.7 !!!!! …and we need to get our attic insulated!
We fly a good bit every year within Europe, but as we live in the “older suburb” (ie very close to city centre) we mostly walk or cycle, shop in local butcher’s, bakery, grocery store. Also we have all the listed enery saving habits. We’re a family of 2 adult and 2 little omnivores.
- Anonymous
  
  Wow You are my inspiration now. I’d really like to have local shops
  nearby that are local farmers, but that isn’t so easy when you’re in the
  city… unless farmers travel to you.
  - Laura
    
    It’s easier for us. We are now more or less settled in our own (small) house, which we bought specifically in an area which is close to city centre, close to airport, has local shops, restaurants, trees, park, schools etc.
    
    We don’t have local farmers here in the capital, but in the greengrocers’ down the road we buy fruits and vegetables that are either home-grown or grown in a country nearby.
    - Anonymous
      
      That’s awesome. I’m glad I took the test because now I can watch out for
      things that will lessen my footprint!
TatiLie

I got 2.05! I was expecting much more considering that you got 2.75.
With my trip to Japan cancelled I scored much less on plane travel. I also credit a lot in the country I live in (although by the charts I’m doing much better than the average), the bright and insulated flat and that we’ve changed our electricity company to one that uses windmill electricity. But they should consider a lot of other carbon footprints (as Fern Miller here in the comments said) like going paperless, having pets (I’m sure that my little carnivorous friend would make me consume a whole Earth more!), the quality of the stuff you buy (that would need less replacement).
Anyway, thank you for posting this. Now, it surely increase my awareness and I hope that my friends take it too.
http://www.movetoportugal.org Laura @ mtp

I took the test and came out a 3 earths….it was hubbies work mileage that pushed it up as it’s over 40k miles a year!!…moving to Portugal becomes a better idea everytime I think about it!
- Anonymous
  
  Ditto. I think we’re going back to Portugal this year.
http://insomniaclabrat.blogspot.com/ Insomniac Lab Rat

Yikes, I got 3.37 earths the first time I took this… I’m guessing one of the main reasons is that we travel halfway across the US about 2 times a year, because other than that almost all of our travel is by public transportation-my carbon footprint was the one that was closest to the national average (I was below it on every category) along with my housing footprint. We’re working on getting more energy efficient appliances, but that costs a lot of money. We live in a condo, so we have control over appliances and stuff, but not landscaping.

We did plant tomatoes, a couple of herbs, and green onions on our balcony, for starters, so once those grow we’ll have a little garden

I know there are a lot of other little things we can try to do, too, though, and the links in the survey are great!
- Anonymous
  
  For us, it’s definitely travel. We fly a lot every year and it adds up.
http://twitter.com/Fernwise Fern Miller

Those tests leave out important carbon sources for most folks: unless they work from home (as I do) it doesn’t take into account the carbon footprint of their job, only travel to/from it.
- Anonymous
  
  That’s true. It should also talk about how little you waste when you are at
  work… paper and printing being one.
Oryx

1.51 earths. Not too bad.

I did a similar test in October ’10 and then I needed 2 earths. So I’m improving! The other test was on the WWF site.
- Anonymous
  
  You are doing fantastic, but seeing as you’re in a country that promotes
  that kind of green living, it’s not hard to do well.
  
  Here, it’s not that simple to find places to compost or recycle, whereas in
  Portugal when we visited, those centers were EVERYWHERE and have been for
  20+ years.
Cat’sMeow

Oh, I did this again. Got 1.07 Earths, so doing really well I guess.
- Anonymous
  
  I think I need to redo the test seriously. I just read what you do.. and I
  DO THE SAME THINGS! ARG! How can we be using 3 Earths?
  
  I should retake it with BF.
Cat’sMeow

According to some other estimate we are doing really well with a small footprint, but I also got quite high score from this test (I forget what it was). This is even though the three of us live in 600 sf apartment, rarely eat meat, use the car only once a week for about 40 miles, otherwise use public transport and bike and walk. Most of our furniture is second-hand, line-dry our laundry, our electricity usage is lower than average.. We live in apartment so don’t grow any of our own food but buy organic food and clothing as much as possible. We recycle, obviously. I don’t know what gives in this test? I really can’t believe it gives an accurate estimate!
http://twitter.com/danawelsh dana welsh-osiowy

I came out as 3.14 and I thought we would be lower – we live in the country and don’t drive much and have a giant garden where we grow most of our food! It is tough though because we have an SUV because we do live in the mountains — carbon footprint = large!
- Anonymous
  
  It’s surprising how much your vehicle can affect your footprint… although
  I wonder if they take an average, or really calculate your vehicle type
  multiplied by how many kilometers you drive.
  
  I mean, I own a really old vehicle but in the past 3 years I’ve driven it
  about 8000km total….!
Meg

“It almost makes me want to have a home so I can implement changes like a greywater recycling system, or being able to grow a full garden.”

Except you probably more than make up for it living as you do — unless perhaps you got a really tiny house.

Still, I do appreciate the amount of control I have living in my own home even though I know that it has greatly increased our impact. I’d miss being able to compost. I like having a nice pole to hang clothes on to dry. But… well, I know I lose out when it comes to the efficiencies of sharing walls with others and living in a smaller space.
- Meg
  
  P.S.
  
  I took the quiz and it came to 3.84. I probably way overestimated how much I use the car, but we do get rightfully penalized a lot for having a free-standing house that is older and not very green.
  
  I wonder what the average is?
  - Anonymous
    
    Hmm.. Maybe I can poke around for an average.
  - TatiLie
    
    When you do the test, in the top of the page shows the average of the country and your results. Maybe if you retake the test you can see how far you are from the average. I did mine again, separating my car time from my husband’s and it make a huge difference.
    - Anonymous
      
      The problem is that the test focuses on you having a home, and having
      furniture.
      
      We were reading the questions, stumped about the furniture stuff, because we
      only own 4 pieces. So we thought — but we don’t even BUY or use furniture,
      isn’t that more indicative of a greener lifestyle than whether or not we buy
      sustainable?
      
      If I separate my car time from BF’s, it makes a huge difference for sure,
      but we’re a household so I didn’t want to play with the numbers…
      
      This test is too general, in the sense that it doesn’t take into account our
      lifestyle, as it is unusual….
- Anonymous
  
  You think so??
  
  I just wonder, because I did the calculation based on how we live now… and
  I feel bad every time I “waste” water that could be reused. And so on..
Fd

thanks!!
- Anonymous
  
  You’re welcome.

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In a Nutshell

other blog: fabulously broke in the city
minimalist since: 2007 -- why minimalism?
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home: hotel room
owns: 3 suitcases 2 carryons of stuff
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practices: rebel yoga and de-cluttering
loves: minimalism, $$ management, traveling
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Thanks to Cassie for the link!

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