Shrinking the footprint is a campaign by the Church of England to reduce its carbon footprint.
The Church of England is the established church of England. The Archbishop of Canterbury is the most senior cleric, although the monarch is the supreme governor. The Church of England is also the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain by the third century, and to the 6th-century Gregorian mission to Kent led by Augustine of Canterbury.
A carbon footprint is historically defined as the total emissions caused by an individual, event, organization, or product, expressed as carbon dioxide equivalent. Greenhouse gases (GHGs), including carbon dioxide, can be emitted through land clearance and the production and consumption of food, fuels, manufactured goods, materials, wood, roads, buildings, transportation and other services.
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The campaign is being led by the Bishop of London, Dr Richard Chartres and was launched on World Environment Day in June 2006 with an invitation to all churches to carry out an energy audit and debate energy-related issues. [1] This is seen as the first step to achieving 'The 20% Church' – cutting carbon emissions from Church activities, structures and processes to 20% of current levels by 2050, in line with the recommendations of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. [2]
The Bishop of London is the ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of London in the Province of Canterbury.
Richard John Carew Chartres, Baron Chartres, is a retired bishop of the Church of England. He was area Bishop of Stepney from 1992 to 1995 and Bishop of London from 1995 to 2017. He was sworn of the Privy Council in the same year he became Bishop of London. He was also Gresham Professor of Divinity from 1987 to 1992. In October 2017, Chartres was made a Life Peer, and he now sits in the House of Lords as a crossbencher; he had previously sat in the House as one of the Lords Spiritual.
World Environment Day (WED) is celebrated on the 5th of June every year, and is the United Nation's principal vehicle for encouraging awareness and action for the protection of our environment. First held in 1974, it has been a flagship campaign for raising awareness on emerging from environmental issues to marine pollution, human overpopulation, and global warming, to sustainable consumption and wildlife crime. World Environment Day has grown to become a global platform for public outreach, with participation from over 143 countries annually. Each year, WED has a new theme that major corporations, NGOs, communities, governments and all celebrities worldwide adopt to advocate environmental causes.
The campaign follows a discussion at the 2005 General Synod that resulted in a call for the Church to engage with the issues of climate change and energy use. [1]
The General Synod is the title of the governing body of some church organizations.
Global warming is the long-term rise in the average temperature of the Earth's climate system. It is a major aspect of current climate change, and has been demonstrated by direct temperature measurements and by measurements of various effects of the warming. The term commonly refers to the mainly human-caused increase in global surface temperatures and its projected continuation. In this context, the terms global warming and climate change are often used interchangeably, but climate change includes both global warming and its effects, such as changes in precipitation and impacts that differ by region. There were prehistoric periods of global warming, but observed changes since the mid-20th century have been much greater than those seen in previous records covering decades to thousands of years.
