computer science

Personal environmental impact accounting

Personal environmental impact accounting is a computer science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Personal environmental impact accounting rather than just read about it. In short: Personal environmental impact accounting (PEIA) is a computer software-based methodology developed in 1992 by Don Lotter for quantifying an individual's impact on the environment via analysis of answers to an extensive quantity-based questionnaire that the individual fills out regarding their lifestyle. The questions are arranged in six areas: home energy and water, transportation, consumerism, waste, advocacy, and…

Key takeaways

Personal environmental impact accounting belongs to computer science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Personal environmental impact accounting to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Personal environmental impact accounting from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Personal environmental impact accounting (PEIA) is a computer software-based methodology developed in 1992 by Don Lotter for quantifying an individual's impact on the environment via analysis of answers to an extensive quantity-based questionnaire that the individual fills out regarding their lifestyle. The questions are arranged in six areas: home energy and water, transportation, consumerism, waste, advocacy, and demographics.

Conception Lotter, at the time a graduate student in ecology at the University of California, Davis, developed the PEIA methodology while teaching a course on the History of Western Consciousness in the UC Davis Experimental College. He realized that, while individuals in contemporary Western society generally have an enormous environmental impact, most were unaware of it, and no method existed for its quantification or assessment.

Development The first software version of the PEIA methodology was EnviroAccount for MS-DOS, written in QuickBasic and completed in 1992. The program asked users 115 questions, then provided a score to indicate the user's personal environmental impact. Lotter later created EarthAware, released in 1996, which built from EnviroAccount, and ran on Windows 3.1. EarthAware provided internet links for users to learn more about their environmental impact. After the test, users could print out their test results and areas for improvement. They would also receive a label ranging from "Eco-Titan" for the most environmentally friendly to "Eco-Tyrannosaurus Rex" for those "bound for extinction" doing the most harm to the planet. Lotter also authored a book on the topic, EarthScore: Your Personal Environmental Audit and Guide.

See also PEIA is similar in concept to the ecological footprint.

Notes and references

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Personal environmental impact accounting

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Personal environmental impact accounting claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In computer science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Personal environmental impact accounting before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Personal environmental impact accounting ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Personal environmental impact accounting

In research: Personal environmental impact accounting appears in computer science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Personal environmental impact accounting in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Personal environmental impact accounting is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Environmental impact assessment, Environmental science software, Types of accounting, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Personal environmental impact accounting outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Personal environmental impact accounting in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Personal environmental impact accounting means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Personal environmental impact accounting out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Personal environmental impact accounting in simple terms?

Why does Personal environmental impact accounting matter?

Because it connects several computer science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Personal environmental impact accounting?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Personal environmental impact accounting.