Assignemnt: Module Four Activity Guidelines and Rubric
Overview: This activity will aid you in completing the potential solutions and personal impact sections of the final project. Based on the issue you have chosen to investigate, you will assess your personal contribution to the problem by analyzing your consumption and/or use of the resource.
Prompt: For this assignment, think about your personal contribution to the environmental issue you chose to present for the final project. Then, you can either monitor and record your consumption or use for a few days and extrapolate the information to represent a year or gather existing data that represents your annual consumption or use.
For example, if the issue you chose to investigate is local air pollution, you could monitor and record how far you drive for a few days, then extrapolate that information to represent a year. This data could be presented as a summary table. You could also summarize your home electric use for the past year using utility bills and present this data as a graph of use over time. Then, state how automobile fuel and the source of your home power (coal, solar, wind, natural gas) impact air pollution. Using the Global Footprint Network's Footprint Calculator or statistics from credible online sources, comment on whether your fuel and power use are typical of U.S. consumption rates and how they rate globally. List the possible alternatives to your resource use (e.g., buy a more fuel-efficient car, carpool or ride a bicycle to work, switch to solar or wind power for electricity). End your submission with a candid discussion of the changes you would consider making to reduce your impact on the resource (e.g., will carpool but will not ride a bike, greener sources of electricity are not available in my area but will adjust my thermostat to use less electricity).
Submit your data as a table or figure and answer the following questions. To aid your reflection, you may want to refer back to your results from Module One from the Global Footprint Network's Footprint Calculator.
Specifically, the following critical elements must be addressed:
- Explain (in 1 to 2 paragraphs) how your use of the resource impacts the environmental issue you have chosen.
- Discuss (in 1 to 2 paragraphs) whether your use of the resource is typical of U.S. consumption rates and how your personal use rates globally. Support your discussion with scientific fact.
- List the possible alternatives to lessen your resource use. (This list should have at least three alternatives.)
- Discuss (in 1 to 2 paragraphs) the changes you would consider making to lessen your personal impact on the resource.