How big is your carbon footprint?

Our modern industrial society emits an unprecedented amount of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, contributing to global climate change.

How much do we as individuals contribute to global warming? There are a variety of carbon calculators available on the Web that can help estimate your carbon footprint, or the amount of greenhouse gas produced by your particular lifestyle.

Chronicle reporter Ilana DeBare worked with researcher Chris Jones from the UC Berkeley Institute of the Environment using the CoolCalifornia calculator ( www.coolcalifornia.org) to estimate the carbon footprints of typical urban and suburban Bay Area households.

Keep in mind that these are very rough estimates, based on average or median data. In some cases, there were no local figures available so we used national data.