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Software Earth Math

Finland Has an App Showing Shopping's True Carbon Footprint (bloomberg.com) 57

Posted by BeauHD from the more-you-know dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Unlike other carbon-footprint calculators already on the market, the application developed by Enfuce Financial Services Oy, a Finnish payment services provider, does not rely on users inputting the data manually. Instead, it combines data from credit cards and banks with purchase data from retailers to provide real-time calculations of how a given product affects the climate. With an estimated 70% of carbon emissions globally attributed to end users, Enfuce chairman and co-founder Monika Liikamaa says the app will help people adapt their lifestyles and make them compatible with the goal of keeping global warming within 1.5 degrees Celsius.

After the initial set up and opt-in, the app will calculate a carbon footprint based on the user's purchases -- to the level of individual steaks or tomatoes. It will then propose actions to reduce their carbon impact. Typical suggestions may include taking a shorter shower, hopping on the bus instead of the car, turning down the thermostat and going vegan for a week. The app is a side project for Enfuce, which already handles sensitive payments data securely. Its core business is to run credit card systems for clients that do not require owning expensive computer servers. Enfuce is in talks with three major banks and is already working with Mastercard Inc. and Amazon.com Inc.'s cloud-server unit. No vendor will have exclusive rights to the system, which should be available by March, the company said.
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Finland Has an App Showing Shopping's True Carbon Footprint More

Finland Has an App Showing Shopping's True Carbon Footprint

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  • Gaming the Fear (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Thursday November 21, 2019 @11:34PM (#59441418)

    So can I get a high score and a cool title like "Carbon Lord" if I produce more than a certain about of carbon buying jeans or what have you?

    Gaming carbon scores may not have the effect they desired, especially not with naturally rebellious teens...

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by GuB-42 ( 2483988 )

      We had this problem when they installed a sign showing your speed on the road, with blinking red lights if you are over the speed limit.
      It was supposed to raise awareness of the speed limit but some people tried to set high scores. They solved the problem by not showing speed above a certain limit, which is just slightly above the legal speed limit.
      In the same way, some breathalyzers don't show BAC over 0.2% or so.

      So in the same way, a solution would be to avoid showing way above average carbon footprints.

  • I'm buying steaks, and am recklessly indifferent to the possibility of a resulting 1.5000000001 Celsius.

    • Re:Heretic of the carbon religion (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Dereck1701 ( 1922824 ) on Friday November 22, 2019 @12:33AM (#59441518)

      And yet, I would bet you'd still fall below the environmental footprint of some "environmentalists". It seems like a few times a month a study is released that shows another so called green product/initiative has more of an environmental footprint than "normal" products/processes. Organic farming that sucks up far more resources than traditional farming, plastic straws/bags replaced by things that are verifiable worse for the environment & energy policies that actually increase carbon production. No doubt we need to minimize our environmental impact, but we need to make sure that our actions have a meaningful impact while at the same time not plunging our species back into the dark ages.

      • we need to make sure that our actions have a meaningful impact while at the same time not plunging our species back into the dark ages.

        But the FEELS! The FEELS! I haven't a clue how to grow things, but I can surely tell YOU how to do that. After all, you're just farmers; it can't be THAT hard. And if you're not doing it the latest buzzword-of-the-day way, then yo're doing it completely wrong.

        Kinda like software and languages, don't cha' know.

      • Re:Heretic of the carbon religion (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Evtim ( 1022085 ) on Friday November 22, 2019 @11:35AM (#59442930)

        There was an initiative to build high-speed pan-European network and basically stop flying to any destination closer than 1000 km. Fuck it, I would use a train to go to my home country (distance 2200 km); takes 2.5 hrs pure flight time (sans delays which are usual) plus another 1-1.5 for check in plus transport to and from the airports (tough, cause they are outside cities, not like the central train station). All in all, door to door it can easily be 6 hrs. A train going 350-400 kph will do just fine. Guess what happened - cancelled! Instead we should buy hyper expensive electric cars (subsidized) and immediately throw away "gas guzzlers" that have another 10-20 years life in them replacing it with batteries, which are soooo environmentally friendly to produces/s. WOW GREEN!

        There was an initiative to derive most of Europe's electricity from North Africa. Massive solar plants and collectors. Guess what happened - cancelled. Instead we should buy gas from Russia because "half the CO2 compared to oil" BUT what about CH4 slip? (I have elaborated on this before). WOW GREEN!

        These are just from the top of my head....I am sure we can have no less than 1000 examples on this site if everyone racks their brain a little....

        There was an initiative to develop biofuels which is the most idiotic idea on the energy market ever. Guess what happened - it was realized! In NL it was a pet project of some influential fuck (professor from TU Delft) and the government went with it (I had the opportunity to tell the son of the fuck what fucks they both are). So now we use precious arable land (in Amazonia!) for growing mono cultures in the most environmental unfriendly manner to make "bio ethanol". WOW GREEN!

        Hey, what about "dead tree books"? We don't need those! I can carry a million volumes on a device of 300 grams! Oh wait, the devices in question (smartphones, tablets, e-readers) are planned obsolete and if by a miracle yours survive the planned obsolescence they will obsolete them with the latest software update! Or the charger port will break down and of course we must buy a new device! WOW GREEN!

        Speaking of electronics - do I have to tell anyone on /. that all tech companies are complicit in the murder of our planet? Let's appease some woke fucks by cancelling "deplorables" online, so perhaps no one will look into OUR carbon footprint, planned obsolescence, enforced obsolescence, endless landfills with old electronics thrown away because a 20-cent (but non-replaceable) part broke down. And software - YES, let us stream everything so the user stays online to watch ads! Let's stream that song 1000 times instead of saving it locally! Streaming runs on unicorn farts and does not pollute! WOW GREEN!

        More than half of the products on the vegetable and fruit shelves in the local supermarket are imported from Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and even as far as Japan. Garlic from Kenia! Dill from Israel! Asparaguses from Argentina! But if you buy a piece of fish from a fish farm 100 km away or a piece of chicken from a farm 70km away or a piece of beef from a farm 50 km away you are a Nazi! Oh, how could I forget - the supermarkets offer wonderful vegetarian options such as cheese.....which is cut in advance in slices ready to be placed on the sandwich for your convenience....and there is a piece of fucking plastic sheet between EVERY slice. Admittedly they do that with ham too and that is another reason why I buy the meat from the above mentioned farmers rather than effing supermarket chains. WOW GREEN!

        The Dutch ride bicycles a lot. I have approx. 45 000 km in 15 years commuting and shopping. You know what - spare parts for bicycles are flimsy and planned obsolete. They catch rust in days. Central axel broken every year! WTF! Lights. Just last week I bought lights - the support broke within 2 days (20 euros, this was not cheap but an expensive model!). Had to buy new ones. In the new ones the front light is flickering already because one of the hollows where the battery

  • Let me make a perdiction (Score:4, Insightful)

    by melted ( 227442 ) on Thursday November 21, 2019 @11:41PM (#59441434) Homepage

    Let me make a perdiction: this will have zero effect on the woke climate change warrior subset of their population it is targeted at. Because it's the small people who need to be making better environmental choices.

    • One of the biggest grocery/general store chains (there really are only two dominant big chains/conglomerates here in Finland) has carbon footprint calculator in its app. The app combines everything from bank operations (they are a bank too) to shopping and services they operate - like gas stations and department stores.

      The user can analyse their finances and purchase in the app - it has digital receipts too so you wonâ(TM)t get a paper receipt at all from the cashier. The CO2 calculator is about food t

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by melted ( 227442 )

        Best things you can realistically do for the environment: don't take that tropical vacation, don't have kids, don't use transporation, keep your apartment cold, don't eat any fruit or vegetables not grown in the immediate vicinity (so no fruit during winter, and few vegetables), etc. That's how people lived in the preindustrial age. People are just not going to do any of this shit no matter how woke and environmentally conscious they are. It's fun to grandstand, it's not so fun to practice what you preach.

      • What this really is, is a calculator that shows you how much of a reduced standard of living is required to satisfy the activists.

    • Because it's the small people who need to be making better environmental choices.

      Trying to push the responsibility off onto Asians, you racist!? :D

      Seriously though, if China, India, Pakistan, & developed/developing sections of Indonesia, and developing parts of Africa don't massively curtail CO2 emissions which would seriously hamstring their development, then it doesn't matter what the West does because it would require a negative amount of emissions to compensate simply because of the massive disparity in size and number of people even accounting for vastly different average indiv

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      The EU already mandates product labels with useful info like running cost (how much energy it uses) etc. When you get on a plane there is a sign showing of efficient it is, what the emissions are, and how much leg room you get.

      Seems like they could add one for web sites. Maybe when checking out they show you how efficient the delivery method is. Could become a selling point for some shops.

  • I've been looking at a 2020 Corvette - I wonder what that would do for my score ...

    • It's mid-engine so your carbon footprint t will go down due to the improved balance and higher weight on the rear axel. And doesn't have a ton of toxic ecologically destructive batteries. Go for it! Save the earth, drive a vette!

      • But if you throw even a single atom of CO2, CO, NOx etc into the air behing you, without cleaning it up, you will be shot to death. Deal?

        Oh, and batteries are retarded. I agree.

        Hint: Get fuel cells. Collect exhause in conpressed gas tank. Carry to desert beach. Recycle to gasoline using nothing but sunlight and water. (Hint: You can use trees, or a chemical process that is a 1000 times faster.)

        Fuck efficienty. It's not like we'll run out of sunlight in the solar system.

  • Well, we're screwed. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by bistromath007 ( 1253428 ) on Friday November 22, 2019 @01:06AM (#59441582)

    By 2030, this will be your social credit score. You're going to be denied a lease if your car still uses gasoline or you eat too many burgers in one year.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Even worse pretty soon all your decisions will be controlled by an "app".

    • Implying the burgers wouldn't be made of insects already. Why punish the plebs for eating meat when you can just make meat illegal? Rumors tell of Party elites dining on fresh beef and vegetables, but such whispers are dangerous!

      Eat insects and live in a pod like good human cattle.

    • Ouch. You're right.

      However you're an optimist in that you think we're going to be given a choice to use gasoline or eat burgers. :( They'll just grey out the option on your phone or whatever we use by then, and that will be that. Get caught with black-market hamburgers and they close your bank account. It's already been done to wrongthinkers today.

      • No it isn't.

        Why are you playing the losing role?
        Do you so desperately *want* vegans to win?

        Vegans haven's achieved SHIT.
        It's actually hilariously pathetic.

        Anybody but soyboys wouldn't even fuck a vegan. So, no reproduction. They harass, bully and terrorize people, few as they are, so even if you meet one, he'll get noting but hating back.

        Vegans only exist as a mental illness of a few city-dwelling studients that never came in touch with actual nature in their entire life, until they grow up.
        And trust me the

        • This has nothing to do with vegans. The billionaires want to reserve what we think of as the American way of life for themselves. They want the rest of us to eat bugs and live in pods, not because it will make them more money, but because it makes us easier to treat as cattle. When their project to get off the planet is ready, they'll just slaughter us without shedding a tear, because we're those *animals* that make living here so awful.

    • I love it when people take an idea (social credit score) created in a totalitarian dictatorship (China) and declare - for no reason whatsoever - (as no political party has so much as proposed anything like this in the US) that EVERYONE IN THE WORLD will be doing it in x # of years.

      Stop projecting your rabid, paranoid fantasies on your political opponents. Both sides have honest people, otherwise elections would not be so close.

      • You have no idea how elections work. They're always close because first-past-the-post voting makes it mathematically inevitable.

  • very scary stuff. creditors combined with climate delusion equals an irresistible control scheme....

  • Finland rules (Score:5, Insightful)

    by uvajed_ekil ( 914487 ) on Friday November 22, 2019 @01:19AM (#59441612)
    As we head into waters that are both hot (getting hotter) and uncharted, well-intentioned people are getting a lot of blow back, often being mislabeled by the fossil fuel industry and its friends (and money) in high places. The result has been that many scientists and other intelligent people who simply care about our world and our future have become reluctant to dream big or promote the change we need. But as has been the case with some other uniquely modern topics, Finland remains unabashedly progressive, in a low-key and very Finnish way. Finns, stereotypically, are very reserved, practical, and pragmatic, while remaining open to reason and to sensible change.

    What I see here is another example of Finland not giving a fuck about climate/science deniers, and I love it. I'm biased because my grandfather is a Finnish-American engineer (I'm Finnish-American too, but identify simply as American because I was raised here) and I identify with his sensibilities, and maybe I'm ranting about nothing, but whatever.
    • I live in Finland, it's been two years now. Can't agree more. Loved to live in US but Finland is far better and safer.

    • Given that they cannot ever talk to strangers or in public? ;))

      Ranting and drinking with the people you grew up with or were forced to interact with is very Finnish aswell as German (my home country), but its purpose is more to avoid actually doing something than to do something. ;)

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Shop for what you want and need.
    Shorter shower - Stay clean and take as much time as your want.
    Hopping on the bus instead of the car. Thats your car, enjoy it everyday.
    Turning down the thermostat - You pay for that energy, enjoy the warmth, cooling. You are not living in some 4th world nation.
    Vegan for a week - Why the need to suggest changes eating? Enjoy the food you pay for want and enjoy. Say no thanks to weather cult food.

  • Is that the same logic by which all costs a business has, ultimately end up as customer costs, and never ever as profit reductions?

    I figure ALL of the carbon footprint that isn't one breathing out or farting CO2, is caused by the process the business chose. ... *chose*! Mainly to maximise profit. Aka the part of the income they did not work for, in return. (If you wanna find out how to legally steal and rob and kill if for it if you have to ...)

  • "it combines data from credit cards and banks with purchase data from retailers". Yup, that's an app I want on my phone - NOT.

    • All that data is already going to the payment providers - all this app is doing is surfacing that information to you (via the company that provides the app).

      Go look up what data they (can) get when you touch your card on that little reader in the porn store: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] (it can be a lot more than "purchase price & vendor").

  • Show the carbon footprint of living in a very northern country with the heaters on all the time.

  • After the initial set up and opt-in, the app will calculate a carbon footprint based on the user's purchases -- to the level of individual steaks or tomatoes. It will then propose actions to reduce their carbon impact. Typical suggestions may include taking a shorter shower, hopping on the bus instead of the car, turning down the thermostat and going vegan for a week.

    OK, so this is about as scientific as the "what kind of dog are you" quizzes. You'll enter a bunch of stuff and it will give you some random suggestion that you already know anyway.

  • But is it comprehensive? (Score:3)

    by McFortner ( 881162 ) on Friday November 22, 2019 @11:10AM (#59442824)
    Can it tell them how big their carbon footprint is from the manufacture of that cellphone and the power consumption (especially the inefficiency because of the ac/dc chargers)? How about all the environmental damage from the mining and refinement of the rare earth elements that make up the electronics of that phone? I bet it doesn't. Hipsters don't want to see their hypocrisy in action.

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