Climate-friendly smartphone app plays on iTunes, Android
platforms
Sacramento — The California Air Resources Board has released a
mobile application for both iTunes and Android platforms that
aims to inspire people and small businesses to reduce their
carbon footprints.
The free CoolCalifornia app, available for download on both the
iTunes App Store and Google Play Store, offers individuals and
small businesses a straightforward, easy-to-use tool for
calculating their carbon footprint and making pledges to reduce
their carbon footprint by, for example, riding a bike more often
or turning off lights.
Using the calculator is simple. App users respond to a number of
questions, such as: How many miles per gallon does your car get?
How much do you spend per month on electricity and gas? How much
trash do you throw away instead of recycling? The result is
calculated in the amount of carbon pollution generated in one
year by those inputs. The app, which is compatible with Apple
and Android devices, features green-living tips and allows users
to share personal stories about how they’re reducing their
climate impact — in the app or on Facebook or Twitter. Sharing
personal stories with friends and family helps to guide behavior
change and promote peer-to-peer environmental awareness.
The app is a portable version of a more comprehensive Carbon
Calculator available at CoolCalifornia.org. Like the app, the
full calculator is an interactive tool that enables individuals
and small businesses to calculate their carbon footprint and make
pledges to reduce it. Either calculator — the app or more
comprehensive calculator — shows users who make pledges what the
resulting emissions reductions will be.
The goal is to inspire app users to make as many as 21
climate-friendly pledges and to check out the Carbon Calculator
at CoolCalifornia.org on their computer, laptop or tablet.
Because voluntary actions are an important element in
California’s climate plan, ARB has developed a variety of tools
and resources to support these non-regulatory efforts.
CoolCalifornia.org provides all Californians, including small
businesses and cities, with the tools they need to make greener
decisions and take climate-friendly actions to reduce their
impact on the planet.
Engaging small businesses, households and others is an essential
part of the state’s ability to achieve the long-term climate
goals of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and moving us away
from our dependence on fossil fuels. ARB commissioned the mobile
calculator to inspire voluntary changes that will reduce carbon
footprints on a household and individual basis, and foster green
economic development.
The CoolCalifornia app was developed by MDS Digital
Communicators, with offices in Santa Monica and Bogota, Colombia,
in partnership with University of California at Berkeley, for the
Air Resources Board. It is the first app developed by the ARB
that is available on iTunes and Google Play.
