The Footprint Family

It's only recently that the footprints have been thought of as a holistic family of indicators.  While we can never fully measure the complexities of our world, as a group they do a good job of giving us a general idea and information we can use to act and create a positive impact.

Full Footprint is an attempt to "bring the family together" under one footprint measure.

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Footprint Family 

Open EU wrote an excellent paper on the interplay of the three footprints and how they can be used together.

For the more visual learners, there is a PowerPoint summarizing many of the main points here .

Water and Carbon Footprint

Article on integration of carbon and ecological footprint from Waterfootprint.org

What's not included in the footprint family?

Some pollutants aren't included in the ecological, carbon, and water footprint families  - the release of materials for which the biosphere has no significant assimilation capacity (e.g. plutonium, PCBs, dioxins, and other persistent pollutants) and processes that damage the biosphere's future capacity (e.g. loss of biodiversity, salination resulting from cropland irrigation, soil erosion from tilling). Source:  http://footprint.wwf.org.uk/

A next step would be listing all pollutants not included in the footprint family, and dividing the pollutants present by the global population for a very rough estimate that those who want to have an even fuller view of their impact can consider. Please get in touch if you would like to work on this area of understanding our impact!
 

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Links to More Articles Coming Soon