I just started reading "Green Living" A book by the environmental magazine - I am just at the introductions however I was surprised by this statement:
" American with only 4.5 percent of the world's population consume 33% of its material. The ecologial footprint of the average American is 30 acres, while the average Italian can get by with less than 15 acres! "
Jim Motavalli ( Editor od E / The Environmental Magazine )

The above was in the introduction to the book and I do not know why the author picked Italian as his only comparison - I just found it interesting -
I think this key factors :
I receive 2 free magazine ( The weekly Rockville Gazette and a daily one - none of which I ever asked for )
The Sunday edition od the Washington post alone should take care of alarge footprint !
I am also having my house renovated and I cannot believe the debree! Italian houses are renovated too but they are designed to last longer ( My house in Bolsena was built somewhere in the 1700 )
Any other factors anybody can think ?
Do you agree with the above ?

Found this website that let's you see how big your eco footprint is:

http://www.myfootprint.org/

I was very surprised at how small mine was, much smaller than the avg. american, but still not small enough. However I also work from home, drive very little and I did not include my wife's statistics. Together I'm sure we are much closer to the american average, which I think is 24-30 acres.

One of the problems in america as far as reducing your footprint is that many of us have to commute long distances to work. public transportation is virtually non-existent if you don't live in a city and even then bus and commuter rail is often horribly inconvenient outside major metorpolitan areas.

Things like paper plates, paper cups, plastic forks and knives, all of those things add up. Even those awful slices of cheese come individually wrapped.

The other problem is that a lot of those things aren't easily recycled. Plastic bags at the supermarket, for instance, take 1000 years to decompose into the ground. More info here:

http://www.reusablebags.com/facts.php?id=2

Americans like disposable things, it makes life more convenient to them. Maybe Italians know how to keep things working longer and understand that anything that is disposable probably isn't needed in the first place.

In my state we all received large recycling bins to use for paper only, and it has helped.

Things like "Green" architecture are helping to reduce the footprint, but we still have a long ways to go.

I agree that we in the US are horrible about using disposable items. Dan, I am also in Maryland (Severna Park) and we recycle glass and plastic as well as paper and cardboard. Everyone I know is pretty good about recycling. I do try to be good about using energy saving lightbulbs and things like that. Luckily, I'm only 3 miles from work, but you are right. Many people need to commute long distances and we have no good public transportation.

Thank's Paolo on an interesting topic. I think Al Gore has done a good job in waking up people to the enviromental changes taking place across the world today. While we all contribute one way or another to polluting the Earth I still am trying to understand it all.
The guage or scale of one's carbon footprint is fairly new to some of us and I don't fully understand or agree with it all yet. How much we as humans contribute to global warming or how much is natural or cyclical weather patterns is widely debated today.In other words some think the Earth is doing what it has always done.
I am a little tired though of all the new Green magazines,theorys, authors etc.I think that there is a sense of alarmism that jumps out at you.They all have different adgendas and answers.New mercury lightbulbs? Do the energy saving outweigh the possible poisoning? And have sprung up overnight.My humble opinion. Don't misunderstand me. I do believe we, us Americans are very wasteful and are very commercial. And have contributed to a vast amount of pollution. My hope is that our bad habits will keep changing for the better. I now have to wait in line to drop off my recyclables, something that was unheard of 5-10 years ago. What I have noticed in just 4 years visiting Italy is that there is more processed food than I remember from my first visit. What do you think? Do you think that with Italys huge growth in tourism and economics that per capita they will catch up to other nations? Just a thought.
With the Italian and American comparison in how much the United States consumes? I think it is a little off. What I do know is that an Italian with 15 acres can grow more than an American with 50 acres.
What I wish someone can tell me is what the hell is going on with the trash in Campania? I have been fortunate to visit Italy the last 4 years and can't believe the build up of trash not just in Naples but further out to surrounding communities. While in Italy this past fall I decided to try and explore a different way to Sorrento from north of Caserta.While I did get lost for a while I could not believe the trash piled on the roadways! It was every where. Outside Benevento, Avellino, Caserta and the neighboring towns. Piles of it. It made me very sad and disturbed to think that the people of Italy won't take charge of there beautiful country and fix this. Can someone give me a real answer? I mean they can't think this is just OK and is going to continue do they? Thank's Ed

You bring up some good points, points that will be debated for years to come as more data rolls in. I too feel that there is a bit of alarmism here in the US about the green movement, but it seems that's just the way things go here with advertisers and marketers always looking for the next big thing. And fear is a powerful motivator!

That being said I am a proponent of living a more sustainable lifestyle not for the health of the planet, but for the health of humanity. Personally, I feel the planet is a self-correcting system and that life will exist so long as our magnetic field keeps the cosmic rays from destroying DNA/RNA synthesis. However if we as a species plan on sticking around longer we have to make sure the earth stays people-friendly. Otherwise the next evolutionary upstart will have our bones in museums next to the dinosaurs.

George Carlin said it best: "the planet is fine, the people are F***ed!"

I found this very interesting too, especially since most Hybrid car owners purchased these cars as a "status symbol" claiming they are saving the environment. Well some statistics and scary facts came in about the Toyota Prius (the best selling hybrid in America)...

Building a Toyota Prius causes more environmental damage than a Hummer that is on the road for three times longer than a Prius. As already noted, the Prius is partly driven by a battery which contains nickel. The nickel is mined and smelted at a plant in Sudbury, Ontario. This plant has caused so much environmental damage to the surrounding environment that NASA has
used the 'dead zone' around the plant to test moon rovers. The area around the plant is devoid of any life for miles.

Gee, what about all those millions of NiMH laptop batteries, digital camera batteries and non-battery uses of nickel? Where does that come from?

The plant is the source of all the nickel found in a Prius' battery and Toyota purchases 1,000 tons annually.

It gets worse:

The nickel produced by this disastrous plant is shipped via massive container ship to the largest nickel refinery
in Europe. From there, the nickel hops over to China to produce 'nickel foam.' From there, it goes to Japan. Finally, the completed batteries are shipped to the United States, finalizing the around-the-world trip required to produce a single Prius battery.

The Prius costs an average of $3.25 per mile driven over a lifetime of 100,000 miles - the expected lifespan of the Hybrid.

Here is the article: http://clubs.ccsu.edu/recorder/editorial/editorial_item.asp?NewsID=188

And that article is from last YEAR. So the next time someone gets all smug because "I own a Prius" you can let him know these facts.

great stuff dan - according to South Park, hybrids are the leading cause of smug in the usa:)

to many, environmentalism is just a fad, and something that they are not interested in researching too deeply. any time someone says they are saving the environment by conspicuous consumption they are full of it.

I personally hate that some eviro groups attack small time fishermen as the only cause of our depleated oceans. meanwhile their largest contributers are petro-chem companies in the guise of "personal donations"

and don't get me started on those carbon credits - the environment does not take cash

great stuff dan - according to South Park, hybrids are the leading cause of smug in the usa:)

to many, environmentalism is just a fad, and something that they are not interested in researching too deeply. any time someone says they are saving the environment by conspicuous consumption they are full of it.

I personally hate that some eviro groups attack small time fishermen as the only cause of our depleated oceans. meanwhile their largest contributers are petro-chem companies in the guise of "personal donations"

and don't get me started on those carbon credits - the environment does not take cash

I agree with you that it is the small-time person trying to make a living that always gets attacked while the billion-dollar corporations cause a lot of damage but go unnoticed.

I am sure my eco footprint is pretty big too, after all I live in a developed country, which has all sorts of disposable that I can use.

All I try to do is switch off lights when we don't need them, use eco-friendly light sources, not use plastic bottles and utensils as much as possible, not use plastic packets unless there is no other option, and various other small things like these.

I am not sure I am helping the environment, but somehow I do feel that little things like this, if continued lifelong, can make a significant difference. But I may be wrong.

And yes, I don't support the system of carbon credits either.

while i'm sure it's true, Americans do also contribute more to the output - production - and sort of, running the world's motor with our outpaced gluttony. I'm not saying it's good, but, whenever America's consumption slows, so does the rest of the world.
With Italians' notorious lack of recycling, dirty car emissions, and other wasteful habits, I'd like to see a comparison between John Smith and Giovanni Rossi in their daily habits...