Why We Like This

This app is revolutionary. If you think about it, there’s really only four modes of consumption. You can either consume conspicuously (i.e., ‘business as usual’), consume consciously, buy secondhand, or be an essentialist (i.e., only consume what is essential for basic living). Now, there’s a ton of secondhand marketplaces out there — and we mean a ton — but there’s very few that do it well. TradeMade does it well. Instead of limiting you to only buying, TradeMade offers an user-friendly interface to trade and barter. You can trade items and services, in any combination, all while not spending a dollar in the process. We all have stuff, and people tend to want stuff, for other stuff…that’s basically how trade and barter works. For the sake of full disclosure, I did have a part of starting this app. 🙂

Oh, and this app also tracks your carbon savings in real-time from buying secondhand, as opposed to new. In other words, when you buy something new, you increase your carbon footprint by the amount of that item…but when you get it secondhand it’s still part of circular economy and doesn’t count as new consumption. In essence, you save by preventing new carbon from entering the atmosphere.

Why We Like This

Oroeco is another revolutionary app in the field of climate change action and climate awareness. To our knowledge, it’s the first and only app out right now that makes carbon footprint tracking fun and social. When you download the app, you enter in a few lifestyle choices and the app does the rest. The carbon data is pulled from existing databases, so when you enter in activities throughout the day, you can see what your carbon impact was. You can also connect with people via the app and see how you compare to friends and people around you. If you aren’t too keen on the social aspect, we encourage you to download it anyway — this way you’ll at least get an understanding of how your activities impact the planet.

Why We Like This

This app started as an app for businesses, as a way for employees to track their fitness goals and environmental impact throughout the week. It’s now open to everyone and is focused on pairing your physical exercise with your carbon impact. For example, the app measures the distance traveled via walking, biking, or riding a car, and calculates the amount of CO2 saved relative to one activity over the other. Changers then rewards you with bonus points, which are called ReCoins. We’re not entirely sure what these points are redeemable for, but we assume in-app gift cards to various stores and outlets.

Why We Like This

A very simple premise and platform that’s doing a great deal of good. Ecosia is a search engine that plants a tree for every search. That’s it. You search, and they plant a tree. Overtime, you can see how many trees you were able to plant on your profile.

Why We Like This

This app still seems to be in its beta phase and is open to only a select group of people, but nonetheless it’s an app you should keep your eye on. When you download the app and make a profile, you select the building you live in and it pulls the energy consumption data from a database (not entirely sure how this technically works). Once you’re connected, you can see how much energy you use, and can be subsequently rewarded for energy saving behaviors.

Right now, they appear to only have a few college dorms available, but check back in every now and then to see if/when they add new locations to their database.