Calculate Your Carbon Thumbprint Using This App

As phones continue to dominate our lives, we’re unwittingly pumping out CO₂ into the atmosphere with so much as a wiggle of the thumb.

We’ve partnered with Belong for the release of their Carbon Thumbprint app.

Using our mobile data to complete even the most mundane task such as sending an email means telcos are relying on power generated from both renewable and non-renewable sources.

That’s not to undercut the efforts of all of Australia’s telcos though — you have companies like Belong which has managed to achieve carbon neutrality by investing in carbon offset and renewable energy projects, which counteracts the greenhouse gas emissions required to operate.

Belong has created an app to demonstrate just how much our phone usage is contributing to Australia’s emissions, drawing attention to how much we can be doing by choosing our telco provider carefully.

The ‘Carbon Thumbprint’ visual calculator does what it says on the box, giving users a visual understanding of their personal contribution to our CO₂ emissions.

The calculator factors in how much time and how you spend your time using mobile data and converts that into kilograms of carbon dioxide. It’s an interesting way to get the point across and at the very least, it’s an aesthetically pleasing way to remind Aussies that we use our phones quite a lot.

But that’s not the point of the app. In essence, the ‘Carbon Thumbprint’ app is trying to educate phone users on the choices they’re making in terms of their telco.

Perhaps this app could seep into the rest of our day-to-day lives, too. I’d personally be much more inclined to practise strict recycling if there was an app on my phone telling me how much I’m singlehandedly harming the planet.

The app is available to download on Android and Apple devices and includes augmented reality to give you a full-blown visual of your own phone’s carbon thumbprint.