On greenhouse gases
Do you know how much greenhouse gases (ghg) your household produces each year? Do we as a community know how much we produce each year?
Acting on climate change is local because currently almost everything we produce or consume involves the use of energy, which continues to come mostly from fossil fuels. Plus these fossil fuels are used to make plastics, which the earth is awash in.
We don’t have to remain in the dark about our contributions to climate change, the looming threat that will continue to be here when the pandemic subsides.
Here’s one way to calculate your household annual greenhouse gas emissions. Go to coolclimate.berkeley.edu/ and open the Cool Climate Calculator in tools and complete the Quick Carbon Footprint Estimate.
The response will be the approximate amount of ghg emissions your household produces annually. It’s measured in MTCO2(e). What is that? It’s the unit of measurement in metric tons (2,205 pounds), with all 6 of the ghg emissions (e.g., methane and nitrous oxide) standardized to one unit mass of carbon dioxide.
If you go back to the Cool Climate and open the link, Cool Climate Maps, USA and hover over Healdsburg, you’ll see that our community carbon footprint is 47MTCO2(e) per household per year.
Because consumption is the primary driver of climate change, we as individuals and as a community should do everything we can to reduce our consumption. We owe it to ourselves and future generations.
 Gail Jonas
Healdsburg
