Pets bring joy, companionship and love to our lives. As pet owners, it is our duty to care for them and ensure their well-being. However, it is also important to consider the impact of our furry friends on the environment. Pets, like humans, have a carbon footprint that contributes to climate change. From the food they eat to the waste they produce, there are a variety of ways that owning animals can have an impact on the environment.

In this blog, we'll explore 10 green practices pet owners can take to reduce their carbon footprint. These practices range from choosing sustainable pet foods to supporting organic pet companies. By making small changes to our pet care routines, we can make a significant difference in reducing our impact on the environment and creating a greener future for our pets and the planet. (More on holisticvetblend.com)

In cooperation with the energy supplier Slovenské elektrárňie – energy services, we put into operation our second largest project in Slovakia – the intelligent battery storage BRAIN by FUERGY with a capacity of 1,296 kWh at the Embraco site in Spišská Nová Ves. This installation not only effectively optimizes energy consumption and reduces costs, but also contributes to reducing the overall carbon footprint and is part of Embraco's long-term strategy to achieve a more sustainable energy economy. (More on fuergy.com)

Some people opt for paperbacks because they are easy to borrow and share. Others will go for e-readers or audiobooks streamed on their phone. But which option is more ecological? The carbon footprint of reading isn't huge compared to other things people do, like travel, and most people don't consider it when choosing how to read a book. But for those looking to make small changes in their lives to reduce their impact on the climate, it might be useful to examine how the ways we choose to read books affect the planet.

A difficult question to answer

Whether it is better to read books in print or on a device is complicated by the complex interplay of resources involved throughout the life cycle of a published work: how books and devices are delivered, how much energy they use to run, whether they can be recycled.

Digital reading is on the rise – especially audiobooks. According to the Association of American Publishers, they now capture about the same share of the total US book market as e-books—about 15 %. However, print is still by far the most popular format. (Chloe Veltman, more at npr.org)

Wealthier people tend to have a higher carbon footprint. They use more energy, and since much of it still comes from fossil fuels, they have much higher carbon emissions than those with lower incomes. This inequality is clear when we examine the contributions of countries by income level. The graph above shows the share of the World Bank's four income groups in global emissions of carbon dioxide (CO ₂ ) and the population using data from the Global Carbon Project. The groups are based on the average income at the country level - they do not take into account differences between people's incomes in individual countries.

High-income countries contribute more than twice their share of the global population: they are home to only 15 % of people but emit 34 % of global emissions. Low-income countries are home to 9 % of the world's population, but emit less than 1 % of total emissions. This difference increases by several percentage points when we take into account the emissions contained in traded goods. (More on ourworldindata.org)

It's been called "the biggest coal machine on Earth" - and most of us use it countless times a day. It is estimated that the Internet and the digital industry connected to it will produce approximately the same emissions as air transport. But we hardly think about the pollution when taking 16 duplicate photos of our pets, which are instantly uploaded to the cloud. (Koren Helbig, more at theguardian.com)

Carbon footprint , the amount of carbon dioxide emissions (CO ₂ ) associated with all activities of a person or other entity (e.g. building, company, country, etc.). It includes direct emissions, such as those arising from the burning of fossil fuels in production, heating and transport, as well as emissions necessary for the production of electricity associated with consumed goods and services. In addition, the concept of carbon footprint often includes emissions of other greenhouse gases, such as methane, nitrous oxide or chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).Noelle Eckley Selin, britannica.com)

The carbon footprint is the total amount of greenhouse gases (including carbon dioxide and methane) produced by our activities. The average carbon footprint per person in the United States is 16 tons, one of the highest in the world. Globally, the average carbon footprint is close to 4 tons. To have the best chance of avoiding a 2°C rise in global temperatures, the average global carbon footprint per year must fall below 2 tonnes by 2050.

The reduction of individual carbon footprints from 16 tons to 2 tons will not happen overnight! By making small changes in our behavior, such as eating less meat, moving less, and drying our clothes, we can begin to make big changes. (More on nature.com)

In a world grappling with the urgent need to combat the climate crisis, the concept of the individual carbon footprint has gained significant attention. We are constantly bombarded with messages about reducing our personal carbon emissions, from driving electric cars to cutting back on meat consumption. How much does our individual carbon footprint matter in the grand scheme of things?

The idea of measuring individual carbon footprints is to hold each person accountable for their contribution to greenhouse gas emissions. It aims to encourage individuals to adopt a more sustainable lifestyle and make environmentally conscious choices. However, the majority of global greenhouse gas emissions are not produced by individuals, but rather by industries and large-scale commercial activities. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), approximately 70 % of carbon dioxide emissions come from just 100 companies worldwide. This staggering statistic shows that individual efforts alone cannot solve the climate crisis. Our personal choices have an impact, albeit on a smaller scale. When individuals collectively adopt sustainable practices, it can create a ripple effect that affects larger entities and prompts policy changes (Martin  Horný and Kateřina Matějovcová, more at cz.boell.org)

A consumption-based carbon assessment is fundamental to assessing responsibility for climate change. However, the results vary widely depending on the chosen cut-off, making them difficult to understand for non-expert readers and hindering their adoption by policy makers. Sankey diagrams are a type of flow diagram where the thickness of the flow is proportional to its value. They make it possible to shed light on the different ways of calculating the carbon footprint and the consequences of choosing one method over another. Although several multi-regional input-output databases allow the calculation of footprints, none of them have been systematically represented as Sankey diagrams. To fill this gap, we are creating an open-access web application that presents the carbon footprint for 49 world regions from 1995 to 2019 based on EXIOBASE 3 data. (Baptiste Andrieu, Hugo Le Boulzec, Konstantin Stadle, more at nature.com)

Scrolling, tapping and swiping are the norm for most smart device users. But did you know that every online activity consumes energy?

Drew Minns, Founder  Really Good Work , specializes in digital sustainability. Creating effectively optimized web experiences is not only an initiative to reduce digital carbon footprints, but also a solution for web users.

Strenuous load times will be speeded up and device battery life can last longer with simple tweaks. (Victoria Fenn Alvarado, more at ca.news.yahoo.com)

The effects of man-made global warming can be seen more and more frequently around the world. This climate disaster will not stop even in Germany. Here, too, we have been confronted for a long time with dying forests, drying up of lakes and bogs, and severe floods - a cry for help from the climate. The IPCC reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change say again and again: We must act now. At worst, we will reach the 1.5 degree climate target between 2030 and 2035 – but very likely before 2040. (Benjamin Thiessen, Matthias Schwarzer, more at nw.de)

For the first time ever, researchers used the power of big data to calculate country-by-country greenhouse gas emissions from air transport for the 197 countries covered by the international climate change treaty. When countries signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992, high-income countries were required to report their aviation-related emissions. But 151 middle- and lower-income countries, including China and India, were not required to report these emissions, although they could do so voluntarily. (Nancy Bazilchuk, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, more at phys.org)

Have you ever wondered when scrolling down the Google search results why you feel like you're paying a price even though it's free? Well, probably because it's not. The real cost of your Google searches is "Digital Pollution".

Did you know that every Google search produces around 7g of CO2? This is a small amount. Then why is this worrying? Because Google processes 3.5 billion search queries every day. Multiply seven by three billion and it's not much, is it?

Let's look at these fast facts: i) the carbon footprint of email is approximately 0.3g - 50g; ii) an average of 294 billion emails are sent per day; iii) from 1995 to 2015, the average weight of websites increased by 115; iv) a 30-minute show leads to the emission of 1.6 kg CO2 eq.; v) online streaming leads to emissions of 30 million tons of CO2 eq. a country similar in size to Spain; vi) the Internet consumes 7 to 10 % of global electricity; vii) one year of computer work is equivalent to the energy consumed by 80 low-energy light bulbs; (INiac on tbsnews.net)

Our daily actions have a hidden but significant impact on the environment. Every document we print or video we stream uses energy and creates emissions known as a carbon footprint. Adopting a more efficient and greener workflow can make a significant contribution to global sustainability. Effectively managing paper consumption can, for example, minimize our carbon footprint. One effective method of doing this is to incorporate PDF files into our digital routine. (Nathan Spears, more at thecanary.co)

Integrating digital technologies into forestry is key to the European Union's Green Deal, the 2030 Forestry Strategy and the National Forestry Strategy, which aim to improve governance and efficiency. However, the administrative aspects of sustainable forest management are often overlooked, despite the potential of digital tools… (Francesco Barbarese, Zacharoula S. Andreopoulou, Walter Mattioli, more at researchgate.net)

Those old clothes may seem like trash to you. But some of the top local second-hand clothing retailers still want them, even with broken zippers or holes. By some measures, the clothing industry is responsible for more greenhouse gases than air and shipping combined. Fast fashion makes it worse and people buy and throw away clothes more often. Decomposing clothing produces methane, a much more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. (KAVITA KUMAR , more at m.startribune.com)

Earth Day may be around the corner, but it's important to make climate-friendly food choices throughout the year. Agriculture contributes about 25 percent of global carbon emissions , so the choices we make about the food on our plates—and the food that ends up in the trash—matter. There is a lot of advice floating around about how to improve these decisions, but sometimes it can be overwhelming. We're here to help you turn that information into action—at least in the kitchen. (Luisa Rodriguez, more at washingtonpost.com)

These days you might be thinking about how to reduce your carbon footprint. Reports on the environmental impacts of burning fossil fuels cannot be overlooked. Even if the problem is big, the small changes you make every day can contribute to a cleaner, greener future.

Before we talk about ways to reduce your carbon footprint, we must first ask, “What is a carbon footprint? A carbon footprint is the sum of all the by-products that come from using fossil fuels to produce and transport goods, build structures for homes and businesses, provide food and travel.

The gases produced by these activities, namely carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and , are called greenhouse gases because they trap heat in the atmosphere, increasing the Earth's average temperature.

Reducing your carbon footprint means changing the way you approach and participate in activities that produce greenhouse gases. This guide will show you how. (More on constellation.com)

The European Parliament voted on Wednesday to pass a law to cut carbon dioxide emissions from trucks, which will require most new heavy-duty vehicles sold in the EU to be zero-emissions from 2040.

The law will enforce 90 % reductions in CO2 emissions from new heavy-duty vehicles by 2040 – meaning manufacturers will have to sell a large proportion of fully CO2-free trucks to offset the remaining sales of new CO2-emitting vehicles.

"We provide transparency for one of Europe's main manufacturing sectors and a strong incentive to invest in electrification and hydrogen," said Green European Union lawmaker Bas Eickhout, the parliament's chief negotiator on the policy. (Kate Abnett, more at insurancejournal.com)