Eat lower on the food chain – more fruits, vegetables, and grains, and less red meat. Watch your waste – water, energy, pesticides, and pollution went into the production of the wasted food, and food waste ends up in landfills where it releases methane gas as it decomposes.

Between farms and plates, most food-related greenhouse gas emissions are from producing food—particularly beef and dairy. Food system activities, including producing food, transporting it, and storing wasted food in landfills, produce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that contribute to climate change.

But beef is by far the biggest offender, generating 60 kilograms of greenhouse gas emissions per kilogram of meat produced—that’s more than twice the emissions of the next most polluting food, lamb. According to data presented by Carbon Brief, beef production emits more than twice the CO2 …

In short, even if you aren’t already a vegetarian, cutting out some meat, especially red meat and large predatory fish, and eating lower on the food chain overall can help significantly lower your personal greenhouse gas emissions.

5 Ways to Reduce Your Carbon Footprint

1. learn the 5 R’s: refuse, reduce, reuse, rot, recycle: Going zero waste is a great step towards combating climate change.
2. bike more and drive less:
3. conserve water and protect our waterways:
4. eat seasonally, locally, and more plants:
5. switch to sustainable, clean energy:

China

Carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) A quantity of GHG can be expressed as CO2e by multiplying the amount of the GHG by its GWP. E.g. if 1kg of methane is emitted, this can be expressed as 25kg of CO2e (1kg CH4 * 25 = 25kg CO2e).

Because trees have been quietly offsetting these carbon emissions for centuries, converting carbon dioxide into the oxygen we need for life. How many trees are needed to offset your carbon footprint? It takes about 1,025 trees to offset the average American’s emissions, with each tree absorbing about 31 lbs.

The most common method is the Tier 1 Calculation Method: GHG emission = 0.001 * Fuel Usage * High heat value *Emission factor. You can get these values from the EPA’s GHG Reporting Program (GHGRP) documentation and your own records.

Calculate the actual emissions by multiplying the emission factor by the actual annual production rate or material usage rate (or whatever units the emission factor is in), and dividing by 2000 pounds per ton.

1 metric ton is the approximate weight of… According to the EPA, 1 metric ton of CO2e is produced by driving from San Francisco to Atlanta in an average car. Or by charging 127,000 smartphones. 5 metric tons of CO2e are produced by the average car driven for 1 year.

Gasoline is about 87% carbon and 13% hydrogen by weight. So the carbon in a gallon of gasoline (weighing 6.3 pounds) weighs 5.5 pounds (. 87 x 6.3 pounds = 5.5 pounds). So, multiply the weight of the carbon times 3.7, which equals 20 pounds of carbon dioxide!

Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas: a gas that absorbs and radiates heat. But increases in greenhouse gases have tipped the Earth’s energy budget out of balance, trapping additional heat and raising Earth’s average temperature. Carbon dioxide is the most important of Earth’s long-lived greenhouse gases.

40,000 ppm

Low level: 50 PPM and less. Mid level: Between 51 PPM and 100 PPM. High level: Greater than 101 PPM if no one is experiencing symptoms. Dangerous level: Greater than 101 PPM if someone is experiencing symptoms.

At the current rate of growth in CO2, levels will hit 500 ppm within 50 years, putting us on track to reach temperature boosts of perhaps more than 3 degrees C (5.4°F) — a level that climate scientists say would cause bouts of extreme weather and sea level rise that would endanger global food supplies, cause disruptive …