In the past I’ve written about calculating your carbon footprint in order to determine how your lifestyle impacts carbon emissions. Today however, I’ve been looking at a slightly different kind of footprint that can be calculated.

My interest was first piqued watching the National Geographic Channel – lately they’ve been playing a commercial for Human Footprint – an upcoming program that is set to air on April 13. In this special presentation, host Elizabeth Vargas and her staff set out to present viewers with a snapshot of not only how much each of us consumes, but also how all of the things that we consume have been created, constructed, manufactured and produced.

In the NGC Blog, Vargas answers questions about the process of laying out everything humans consume, and how it has impacted her own life – in actually paying attention to everything that comes into the home.? I thought all of this was pretty interesting myself, and set out to find out more about the project. Since this particular Human Footprint project is still upcoming however, I wasn’t able to find too much information – maybe they’re afraid that too much advance information will spoil the show!

Instead, I looked around online and found the UK television Channel 4 has created their own Human Footprint show and website. By entering your birth date in their site, the Human Footprint Calculator generates an estimate of how much you have consumed since birth. While I am expecting the National Geographic Human Calculator to be somewhat scary, the Channel 4 project is kind of cheeky and made me launch more than cry.

After entering my information, I found out that I’ve taken an average of 12,627 pills over the course of my life, and also that I’ve live approximately 1,042,070,400 of my allotted 2,475,576,000 seconds so far. While the little tidbits like these, which include how much vomit I have emitted since birth, how many microwaves and TVs I’ve owned, and how many centimeters my beard has grown (odd, since I am a woman), the real value of the site is in the “more information” links attached to each factoid.

For each of the categories that the Human Footprint Calculator spits out, you can click on their additional resources links and be taken to informative sites. Although most of the links are to British organizations (and all of the measurements are in the English system), I thought the entire project was interesting and worth a look.

Stay tuned, I plan on reviewing the National Geographic Human Footprint, and I’m sure they’ll have some helpful follow-up information on the program once it’s aired.