So there is this really cool thing that I discovered thanks to Island Gal over at NYC Island Gal and that is a German organization that is working on neutralizing the carbon footprint of the blogsphere. This is a pretty interesting concept, and the fact that it is free makes it even better. Sure, many hosting services off the option to host your site on “green” servers, but usually you end up paying a premium for that service, and in the end, shouldn’t being green be something we just do and not have to pay for?
I can’t really tell you what else this company in Germany does on account of the fact that their entire website is in German. I am not really sure how to even get to the english part of the site that talks about the project other than via the links that I have seen. As soon as I started clicking around the site I was back in German. I suppose then this would lead many to wonder if they are even legit in what they are doing. I can’t speak to that, but as the program is FREE, then we, the end users, don’t have anything to lose other than one blog post.
So here is what these guys are doing: First, you write a post about them (like this one), then you send them an email, and they will then plant a tree for your blog in a forest in California. They also would like you to display a badge on your blog, which is fine with me. Why does this work? Well, according to them, the average blog produces around 8 pounds of carbon every year. The average tree scrubs about 11 pounds of carbon each year from the atmosphere. So by planting one tree for every participating blog, you actually neutralize more carbon than the blog produces.
Why do blogs produce carbon? Well, you have to consider that no matter where your blog resides, be it on blogger or wordpress.com or on your own server or hosting account, that machine uses a lot of energy to host your blog. Most of us are not on dedicated servers, even those of us who are self hosted are usually on a communal server in a server farm somewhere. So, not only is the server itself using energy, but it takes a lot of energy to maintain the servers and keep them cool and functioning. This all contributes to the carbon footprint of your blog. I suppose you also have to consider the energy used by your own computer when you write posts as well!
If you want to read more and see the quoted research that all this information is based on, you can fid it here. I didn’t think that I needed to take up too much space quoting them. As I said before, they sound pretty legit about the whole program, and any little thing we can do to make an impact in helping out our home seems like a worthwhile cause to explore. So, if you are interested in joining the cause or finding out more information, here is a link to the organization.
Just a few easy steps to make it green:
- Write a blog post about the initiative + insert your favorite button
- E-mail the link to your post to [email protected]
- They’ll plant a tree for your blog in Plumas’!
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