Hollinger in Antarctica

What do you do in Antarctica when you are confined to your tent for yet another day? As the focus of one of my science projects (cryoconite holes) is buried under thigh deep snow I decided to use my day productively and bring together some of the data for my second project – to determine the ecological footprint of the expedition. The ecological footprint is a measure of consumption of resources and quantifies the environmental impact of our transport, food, clothing, equipment, waste and fuel use. I am quantifying it by using data from when we left Heathrow until we return there again, although there will be the impact of training weekends and of getting to Heathrow itself. I have entered data into a spreadsheet and will have the help of Best Foot Forward (an organisation that specialises in ecological footprinting) when I return to the UK to standardise and interpret the data. Probably the biggest impact is on the global environment through CO2 emissions from our air travel in actually getting to Antarctica. We flew from London to Madrid, on to Santiago in Chile then on to Punta Arenas before flying into Antarctica. In Antarctica we took one Twin Otter flight on 16th November and since then we haven’t used any motorised transport. I often ask myself, ‘how much motorised transport would I have used in this time period if I was back in the UK?’ I feel we have had a relatively small impact on the local environment. Water use is minimal; the last time I flushed the toilet and used water to clean my teeth was on 10th November, the last time I had a shower and washed my hair was on 9th November and the last time I used a washing machine to clean my clothes was 29th October. I think of the amount of water I would have used had I been at home. The last time I turned on a light switch was 9th November and I can’t even remember the last time I watched the TV, changed the thermostat on my heating or charged my mobile phone. How much energy do all these activities consume? In contrast, in Antarctica our energy use has been minimal; we have used 68litres of fuel for all our cooking, (heating?) and melting snow for water. Finally, over the last month how much waste have you put into your wheelie bin? We have generated 15kg of food rubbish and 65kg of poo! Now when I flush my loo at home I will give more thought to where it goes.

I haven’t been working on the footprint all day; other activities included watching ‘The Ladykillers’ and planning for the Antarctic Olympics. The events had to be postponed today due to bad weather (something to so with 20cm of snow and 30 knot winds) so watch the update tomorrow for more details! Happy birthday to Lewis 8IA and Aliyah 8RG.