Ecological Footprint

What is Ecological Footprint?

Within Earth & Environmental Science, which covers our planet, its resources and ecosystems, and how people can protect the environment, this topic explains Ecological Footprint. Earth and environment topics show how the planet’s systems shape landscapes, climate and life, with models that make these processes visible.

Check that you can explain Ecological Footprint in your own words and give one example from everyday life. If you can do that, you have understood the core idea.

Understanding Ecological Footprint helps you explain the environment around you and weigh up how people can protect it.

Ecological Footprint in detail

The ecological footprint measures the amount of productive land and water needed to supply the resources a person, city or country uses and to absorb its waste, in global hectares. It is compared with biocapacity, the planet's ability to regenerate resources.

Globally, humanity uses the equivalent of about 1.7 Earths each year, meaning we are overshooting what can be sustained. Footprints differ greatly between countries and lifestyles. Components include food, housing, transport, goods and services. Reducing your footprint involves eating less meat, saving energy, using public transport, buying less, wasting less and choosing sustainable products.

How the interactive helps you understand Ecological Footprint

Watch the bar chart in the interactive. Use any sliders or buttons it offers to change the values and see how the bar chart responds.

Before you change anything, predict the result. Then change one value at a time and check whether your prediction was right. This is a quick way to build a correct mental model of Ecological Footprint.

Real-life uses and examples

• Use a diagram of Ecological Footprint to describe the steps of a process in order.
• Discuss how human activity changes Ecological Footprint, using a named example.
• Explain how Ecological Footprint affects the landscape or climate near you.

Common mistakes to avoid

• Describing a process without the timescale it works over.
• Presenting one cause as the only cause of an environmental change.
• Learning the definition without testing it. Use the quiz and the interactive to check that you can apply the idea.