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Topic 3: Environmental Choices

Topic 3: Environmental Choices. Ecological Footprint. Many people use more than their share of the Earth’s Natural Resources. SUSTAINABILITY –natural resources are being replaced or renewed at least as quickly as they are being used.

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Topic 3: Environmental Choices

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  1. Topic 3: Environmental Choices

  2. Ecological Footprint • Many people use more than their share of the Earth’s Natural Resources. • SUSTAINABILITY–natural resources are being replaced or renewed at least as quickly as they are being used. • Many of our resources are shrinking –forests, fish populations

  3. ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT-calculation of the total area of land and water needed to supply all of the materials and energy that we use as well as absorb all of the waste that we produce. • Includes food, water, housing supplies, products, and energy we use. • Which countries do you think have a large ecological footprint? Small?

  4. Surface of our planet = 51 billion hectares • -ocean -desert -mountain tops-land covered by pavement or concrete... • =8.9 billion ha of useable land for 6 billion people. • Our ecological footprint will get bigger depending on the kind and amount of energy, products, disturbances and pollution we are associated with.

  5. http://www.mec.ca/Main/home.jsp?bmUID=1271052143652 • Right now, most Western countries use more resources, more energy, and create more waste and then is sustainable. • HOPE: we can still reduce our ecological footprint and impact on our prescious environment by: • Be aware of natural resources we consume • Reduce the amount of energy we use • Reduce the amount of products we buy • Reduce the amount of waste we produce

  6. Ways we could reduce our ecological cost of food: • Use food grown locally • Use food grown organically • Reduce the amount of meat in our diets (vegetarian meals have a smaller ecological footprint because it is not consuming all the resources used in processing the meat) • Reduce the amount of processed foods in our diets (lots of resources to get to us, energy, packaging)

  7. 3 R’s: REDUCE • Limit the amount of garbage you produce • Avoid buying overly packaged, disposable or unnecessary products • Use cloth re-usable bags

  8. 3R’s: REUSE • Rather than throwing products away, find another use for them. • Buy products that you can use again and again rather than disposable ones • Plastic containers rather than saran wrap or foil, wash ziploc bags, buy or sell/donate used clothing

  9. 3R’s: RECYCLE • If you can not avoid buying a product that there is no other use for, look for ways to recycle them. • Compost kitchen scraps • Blue bag or boxes, recycle centers • If you can, buy products made of recycled products • PET Cycle • Polyethylene terephthalate(PET) makes up plastic beverage containers • 10 million pounds/year are sent from Alberta to Georgia and is mostly used to make residential carpet and fleece!

  10. Humans do not usually intend to cause harm to their environment • Why do we have sustainability problems?

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