Little Web Feet

Our Footprint PDF Print E-mail

The average footprint for people in Canada is 20 tonnes
The average for all industrial nations is about 11 tonnes
The average worldwide carbon footprint is about 4 tonnes
The worldwide target to combat climate change is 2 tonnes
(statitics from carbonfootprint.com)

Little Web Feet's total carbon footprint is 2.06 tonnes/year.

We achieve this by running our company sustainably. We do not start off with a large footprint and then just buy our way out of it. We start by reducing our energy needs and consumption and by finding creative alternatives in everything we do. At the end of each year we offset our already little carbon footprint of 2.06 tonnes by purchasing REC's.

How Do We Have Such A Small Footprint?

Our Servers:

Our servers are 100% powered by solar panels and therefore are carbon-free.
In fact the entire data centre runs on electricity derived solely from solar panels. The data centre was built to be extremely energy efficient in order to make this possible. Read about our green data centre for more information on how it works.

Our Office Utilities:

Our office is located in a renovated heritage building. The renovations were designed to be environmentally friendly and the building is now LEED certified. Our office is heated and cooled with Geothermal Energy thereby reducing our need for electricity, gas, coal or oil. We only use energy efficient equipment and appliances in the office thereby reducing our need for electricity. We use an average of 6000kw of electricity per year. According to carbonfootprint.com this equals 1.78 tonnes of carbon emissions. This is the main part of our carbon footprint. Although currently we offset this with REC's, we are working towards having our office run directly off of solar power like our data centre and eventually be entirely carbon-free in our electricity consumption.

Our Transportation:

We only conduct business locally or virtually, and therefore do not need to take flights. Our employees pledge to cycle, walk or take transit for work purposes and therefore we only need to calculate the carbon emissions created by public transit. We calculate that we take the Toronto subway, streetcars and buses an average of 4000km a year, which, according to carbonfootprint.com, is equal to .28 tonnes of CO2. We offset this carbon with REC's

Secondary Footprint:

Before we buy anything we ask questions. Where did this come from? Who made it? What did it cost the earth? And what and who will we be supporting by purchasing it? This governs all of Little Web Feet purchases, no matter how small.

Services and Partnerships:

We ask about the carbon footprint of all the companies we purchase products and services from. We also do a huge amount of research on the products themselves. We choose companies that are dedicated to reducing their carbon footprint as well as having an overall committment to both the environment and social justice and products and services that are environmentally sustainable.

Water:

Our office building collects and uses rainwater for all grey water usage, (flushing the toilet, watering the plants, etc.), we also use low-flow appliances and aerators to reduce water usage. We have installed our own water filtration system to eliminate the need for plastic bottles of any kind, which are both a health and environmental problem.

Building Materials:

All the building materials used in the construction of our office building were environmentally friendly, (the building is LEED certified). In addition to that, all the wood used in the interior design of our office was FSC certified or recycled and all the paint was low-VOC or no-VOC.

Furniture:

We only buy furniture that is certified eco-friendly, is second hand, or is made from recycled goods.

Office Equipment:

Our computer equipment is energy efficient and we buy second hand equipment when possible. We also use our equipment the full length of it's life span and dispose of equipment safely and properly.

Packaging:

When we need to buy brand new products, which is rarely, we always choose products with the least amount of packaging

Promotional Materials:

We are 90% paperless. However, when we have to use paper we only use 100% Post Consumer Waste recycled paper from a company who buy REC's to offset their electricity usage. We also only use vegetable based inks and waterless printing services.

Food:

The food we buy for the office is always organic and fair trade as well as locally produced whenever possible. We compost all our food waste at the STOP Community Food Centre which is also located at the Wychwood Barns.

Cleaning Products:

All the cleaning products we use in the office are 100% biodegradable, non-toxic, and are packaged with recycled and recyclable packaging.

read more about our green office
read more about our green data centre

Last Updated on Thursday, 25 June 2009 02:28