Sustainable Labels

The problem we are all aware of as “global warming”, is happening for real! Humans are at the centre of global climate change: their actions cause anthropogenic climate change. Creating Awareness about how individuals are responsible for Greenhouse Gas emissions when they consume products or services, as well as driving social change to promote responsible consumption and production is very important. Every action matters, including influencing choices made. ‘Carbon Footprint Labelling for Responsible Consumption’: In case of managing climate change and its drivers, I think the first step is to create ‘Consumer Awareness’ of carbon footprint by labelling the total amount of greenhouse gases generated in the production of the raw materials, processing, manufacturing, packaging, and transportation of finished goods & services that they consume. A few examples of where carbon footprint labels should be included on are: Gasoline receipts, Electricity receipts, Telephone receipts, All packaged Goods, and, Office or Computer generated receipts. Once a consumer is aware of what their own contribution to climate change is, they can choose better options. It is not reasonable to expect labelling to solve a complex problem by radically shifting the behaviour of most or all consumers. It is reasonable, however, to expect that labelling may improve a consumer’s ability to make choices that may influence companies to change the processes that they follow today. Nutritional labelling, for example, has not eliminated diet- related health problems, but they do influence product selection and consumption. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) (1) recognises Lifestyle and behavioural change as one of the feasible areas to manage climate change. Optimistically, the consumer can start driving some of these changes by using or demanding for low carbon footprint products and services, leading to responsible consumption. There are methods and technologies available to compute the carbon footprint at desired level, however, what we need is a social and political will to create awareness and make the change. In this project we explore using blockchain for tracking carbon footprint from start to end of a process in both product and service.

It is a team of 3 11th graders.