How are carbon footprints calculated? What data is needed? How do you even collect that data? This course on carbon footprinting will explore all of these questions, and more. There are many greenhouse gas inventory tools to assist with the footprint calculations, but the result is only as good as the data you enter. An inventory data set must be both complete and accurate for your baseline and tracking calculations.
In this 4-hour virtual course, we will explain the data collection and calculations that go into calculating a carbon footprint. This course will explore the following topics:
This data-focused course will provide the basic information you need to collect and process a data set for a carbon footprint. We will also explain how the calculations “behind the scenes” work in greenhouse gas inventory tools. We will demonstrate these concepts using SIMAP (www.unhsimap.org), a carbon and nitrogen footprint tool that is hosted by the UNH Sustainability Institute.
This course will include presentations from the instructors, breakout group discussions, hands-on data exercises in breakout groups, and Q&A sessions. We recommend that you take “Introduction to Carbon Footprinting” before this course. If you’d like to take this course first, please contact the instructors.
This course is offered free of charge to current UNH students. Please reach out to Jennifer Andrews for details jennifer.andrews@unh.edu.
Jenn Andrews has spent the past two decades supporting climate action and sustainability across sectors. Since 2013 she has been at the University of New Hampshire working with faculty, staff and students to meet campus sustainability goals; directing efforts to help higher education institutions and other organizations undertake carbon and nitrogen tracking and management, with the Sustainability Indicators Management and Analysis Platform (SIMAP); and coordinating and collaborating with other sustainability professionals in the public and private sectors to strengthen the sustainability field. Before coming to UNH she worked for a New England-based, climate-solutions focused nonprofit.
Allison Leach is a postdoctoral researcher with the UNH Sustainability Institute. She is a developer of the nitrogen footprint approach, and she led the integration of the nitrogen footprint into SIMAP. She currently works on SIMAP research & development. Prior to arriving at UNH, Allison was a researcher and graduate student at the University of Virginia where she developed the first-ever university level nitrogen footprint model. She holds a B.S. and M.S. in Environmental Sciences from the University of Virginia and a Ph.D. in Natural Resources and Environmental Studies from the University of New Hampshire. Her dissertation was titled "The Nitrogen Challenge: Footprints Tools and On-Farm Solutions."
