It is not very common for businesses or institutions to account for their nitrogen footprint or report as much as we have heard of carbon footprint. Nitrogen, however, is not something we can no longer ignore as it actually accounts for a large amount of daily activities in a business environment. On a greater scale, nitrogen can work as a catalyst to bigger issues such as climate change which only gets worse due to emitting of nitrous oxide (N2O) and nitrogen oxides (NOx).
Usually you can measure your personal carbon footprint by accounting for your daily activities, [to calculate your nitrogen footprint head to http://www.n-print.org/]. However, The University of Melbourne has taken it a step further by being one of the first institutions to calculate their nitrogen footprint for the entire university. This was a sum of individual activities calculated together accounting for factors such as powering lecture theatres and food waste. The results were shocking as they realized that they, in fact, have a very large nitrogen footprint of around 139 tonnes of nitrogen with food, energy use and transport being the main contributors to it.
Once institutions start to account for the actual amount of emissions they personally contribute to, it makes it easier to set target for the future as the results are quantifiable. As with the University in Melbourne, it is essential for businesses to be aware of their actions in order to move forward and create a more sustainable long-term business strategy.
Some useful methods businesses could employ in the short term to reduce their nitrogen footprint start with air travel and food choices. Ironically, these two are the hardest to change as it involves a shift in human behavioural patterns to support sustainability. As with the Australian university, they found that the biggest nitrogen emissions came from the production of meat and dairy products- cutting down on these two comes at a huge mental cost too. Travel is difficult to alter especially if it works related as conferences today are set all over the globe in order to attract delegates to exotic locations. Energy efficiency is also a contributing factor which can easily be altered in offices as they switch to energy efficient products and switch to alternate energy sources such as with the setting up of solar panels and local hydro plants.
