The Carbon Hero! Re-Imagining Your Carbon Footprint

by ScienceDave | February 25, 2008 at 08:40 pm | 386 views | 4 comments

Talking about carbon credits, carbon footprints, or carbon taxes is a complex process. Most people don't have an intuitive sense of what carbon dioxide is, what it looks like, how its measured, and exactly how we produce it. Furthermore, it is very easy to forget about processes larger than yourself or your immediate environment (energy comes from somewhere, right?).

The folks at Carbon Hero (with whom I have no affiliation) have developed an (dare I say) ingenious way re-imagining your carbon footprint - in real time. The device boils down to a hand held GPS device, with software containing various algorithms that can determine your mode of transportation. The information is then sent to a mobile phone and viewed by the user.

It was back in 2006, that Andreas Zachariah came up with the idea of a small and practical device to track personal CO2 emissions during travel. It determines the carbon footprint of travellers using different modes of transport by using satellite navigation data to measure the distance, identify the type of transportation and calculate the amount of CO2 released into the atmosphere through travel.

With Carbon Hero, to see the effect a journey is having on the environment you just need to look at your mobile phone. “The feedback loop is almost immediate,” says Zachariah.

It is also educational in that by giving an idea of the environmental impact of different types of transport - whether by train, plane, bike or by foot - it allows users to easily compare one kind of travel with another and calculate the environmental benefits daily, weekly and monthly.

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Rob Peters

at 21:16 on February 25th, 2008

good stuff:

Thanks ScienceDave. Carbon footprint is such an abstract idea that something like this is needed to make it tangible. Good find.

Rachel Nixon

at 21:22 on February 25th, 2008

It's certainly a good way of making it real, as Rob says. But I wonder how much people will change their behaviour as a result? That's the test of how effective this kind of device would be, I reckon.

ScienceDave

at 23:31 on February 25th, 2008

That's the test of how effective this kind of device would be, I reckon.

And I suppose you'd be right to reckon, Rachel. Of course, the company's website only claims that "research" has shown people prefer if complex problems are made easier to understand. B i g s u r p r i s e.

The question of whether this is just a ploy to make money off unsuspecting greeno's, or an honest attempt to help folks understand their lifestyles better will remain to be seen.

Barry Artiste

at 22:43 on February 25th, 2008

good stuff:

ScienceDave, quite an interesting article, as you stated most people don't have an intuitive sense of what carbon dioxide is, what it looks like, how its measured, and exactly how we produce it.

Since CO2 is all around us including inside our home, car, office, and the big outside world how can this device accurately measure a persons own individual carbon dioxide level of the outside of their car when travelling I wonder? Especially when other cars are driving all around them? Or am I missing something here? Considering outside CO2 levels in Vancouver measure anywhere around 325-400 ppm depending on the weather and depending on pressure systems, traffic, etc. And indoor CO2 Levels anywhere from 700ppm-to 3,000ppm for a stuffy midday office full of people, it makes me wonder if there some proven new fangled technology available I could purchase. I am sure there are many people in office buildings suffering from high CO2 levels due to inadequate outside fresh air supply and exhaust (Air changes), and everyone exhaling in the same airspace who I know totally frustrated at their office building would jump at the chance at pointing the finger at an individual and blaming him or her for hogging all their individual airspace. Or even a over heated photocopier. Just imagine office people with these CO2 personal devices all walking around amongst each other in the office with religious fervor monitoring others and blaming them for their bad air. hahaha, what a circus.

I really hate to be a fly in the turd pudding, but as a fellow environmental scientist, I am sure you will agree, some manufacturer somewhere is jumping on the environmental bandwagon sucking in gulliable consumers who still believe Gore's theories are a be all end all, all the way to the bank.

I cannot buy that a device can direct analysis of a specific cause or contributor of an single individual CO2 source in an atmosphere full of CO2. Identifying each CO2 from where it came from is sort of like trying to fit a blank jigsaw piece amongst billions or other identically blank jigsaw pieces which are all the same size, configuration and colour. Of course unless the CO2 device is inserted inside ones mouth or car exhaust or BOTH. Now that would be a sight to see, especially if the unitiated hooked the wrong CO2 sensing tubes, by mistakenly hooking the CO2 sensing tube from their vehicle exhaust pipe into their mouth by mistake.

Though I think the coroner would class it as Suicide by Stupidity.