Food Energy Water Footprint

Karen Kirk and John Thomas devised a rubric for calculating an individual's food, energy, water, and waste footprint in a web available document entitled, "LIFESTYLE PROJECT" (https://serc.carleton.edu/introgeo/enviroprojects/lifestyle.html). I modified the calculations a bit to include public transportation, water use in food, and more detailed food energy values. I recorded as much food and energy usage as I could remember over a two day period. I found that I use about 250,000 BTU/day and 850 gal water/day. 85% of the water use was in the preparation of my food (using numbers from farm to table). I was surprised by two things. Even though I used a car for only 14 miles over the two period, it accounted for 67% of my transportation energy. This was surprising because I travel close to 30 miles each way to work (by bus & train). The environmental value of using public transportation during rush-hour was very apparent here. The second surprising revelation was that my refrigerator accounted for 25% of my total energy use. Upon further thought, it does not seem to be unreasonable; after all it is one of the few energy draining appliances that runs 24 hours per day. I will definitely shop around for a more energy efficient refrigerator.