Measuring your ecological footprint

How environmentally sustainable is the lifestyle enjoyed by Bayside's community?
Are we using more than our share of the world's natural resources?
The ecological footprint provides some answers to these, and other, challenging questions.

The ecological footprint is a way to measure the environmental costs and impacts of a wide range of aspects of lifestyles.

It allows us to summarise our level of sustainability in a single value - the area of land required to sustain our level of resource consumption and waste disposal.

Bayside's ecological footprint

Working in partnership with Victoria’s Environment Protection Authority (EPA Victoria) Bayside City Council has established the first Ecological Footprint profile for an Australian local government area.

Through surveying residents, we have found that the average footprint of Bayside residents is 8.3 hectares, although some people's ecological footprint is as low as three hectares, and others as high as 27 hectares!

View the Bayside Ecological Footprint Report.

Bayside City Council will use this eco-footprint profile as a way to track changes in the environmental sustainability of the community. In addition, through integrated cross-analysis with other socio-economic indicators, the Council will be able to target its strategies and programs to those areas where they can have the greatest effect at reducing eco-footprint.

Calculate your ecological footprint

You can calculate your own ecological footprint using EPA Victoria’s Ecological Footprint calculators which take into account local conditions and factors.

You can learn more about how Ecological Footprints are calculated by reading the fact sheet prepared by Bayside City Council. There is also a fact sheet on how to Reduce your Ecological Footprint.

22-Apr-2009