Keeping track of all the new eco friendly words being thrown around nowadays can be a daunting task that can easily make you feel left out of the loop.  Our Lexicon of Eco friendly Words series will attempt to make you hip to the “green” word on the street.  Toss them around and increase your eco-cred (see Volume I).      

Carbon Footprint is “the total set of GHG (greenhouse gas) emissions caused directly and indirectly by an individual, organization, event or product” (UK Carbon Trust 2008). An individual, nation, or organization’s carbon footprint is measured by undertaking a GHG emissions assessment. Once the size of a carbon footprint is known, a strategy can be devised to reduce it.  You can look through some of our previous blogs for tips that will help reduce your carbon footprint.  A good first step is switching to stainless steel water bottles and reusable shopping bags.   You can shop online for both here at Planet Forward. 

Carbon Neutral can be described as the practice of offsetting your carbon footprint by funding or contributing to ‘carbon projects’ that lead to the prevention of future greenhouse gas emissions, or by buying carbon credits to remove (or ‘retire’) them through carbon trading. These practices are often used together with energy conservation measures to minimize energy use.  You can also plant a tree which offsets 25lbs of carbon.  

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), also known as corporate responsibility, corporate citizenship, responsible business, sustainable responsible business (SRB), or corporate social performance,   is a form of corporate self-regulation integrated into a business model.  Essentially, CSR is the deliberate inclusion of public interest into corporate decision-making, and the honoring of a triple bottom line: People, Planet, Profit in every business decision.

Sustainability, in a broad sense, is the capacity to endure. In ecology the word describes how biological systems remain diverse and productive over time. For humans it is the potential for long-term improvements in wellbeing, which in turn depend on the wellbeing of the natural world and the responsible use of natural resources.

Zero waste is a philosophy that encourages the redesign of resources in such a way that waste is reduced to zero. Put simply, zero waste extends current approaches to recycling by introducing the concept of circular systems in which as much waste as possible is reused, similar to the way that resources are reused in nature.

That’s it for this edition.  Check back for future instalments of our Lexicon of Eco friendly Words.  If you have any to add, please feel free to submit your entries to us.  Together, we can keep each other in the  eco friendly loop.