Ecosia.org is a relatively new search engine that “like Google, but very different: we use our ad revenue to plant trees where nature and people need them most.” Ecosia finds places in the world where the ecosystem depends on and needs trees to survive and thrive, and uses their profits to lift those environments up. Concerned about climate change? One of the major side effects to the rising climate is that it prevents biodiversity, according to sciencing.com. This is one way that each small action helps. I couldn’t even keep track of how often I use google–it’s embedded into my life. Luckily, Ecosia fits into my life pretty easily, it’s an easy-to-add-on Chrome extension with a similar user experience and format to Google. Using Ecosia is a very low effort way to help the environment.
Ecosia also sets a good example among other search engines, social media, or otherwise software related corporations. Ecosia releases their financial activities each month, along with receipts that show that they’ve planted the trees they’ve promised. And so far it seems to be going successfully, since there are “over 67 million trees planted” according to info.ecosia.org. Ecosia also respects privacy of its users. Both their main webpage and the information page make it clear that Ecosia’s profits are not gained from selling data to companies.
All in all, I think Ecosia has taken many of the public’s least-liked aspects of search engines and improved upon them. The CO2 positive tree planting is just an awesome bonus.
Reference: ecosia.org
info.ecosia.org
https://sciencing.com/climate-change-affect-biodiversity-23158.html
I recently heard about Ecosia when someone recommended I try it due to the recent Amazon forest fires. I wasn’t the only one, apparently. According to Wharton (2019), Ecosia has seen their user numbers increase by 1000% over the week before this article was published. While the Amazon Forest Fires are a terrible thing, on the bright side they have at least increased awareness for this search engine. Unfortunately, the financial report for August of this year has not been released yet, so I am not sure yet how much their income has increased because of this, but it is almost certain that it has increased substantially.
One last thing I found in my source is that, according to Wharton, Ecosia also powers its search engine through solar power. I found it nice that they also are environmentally conscious in that way.
References: Wharton, Jane, (27 August, 2019,) People flock to search engine that plants trees after Amazon rainforest fires, Metro, Retrieved on september 15 2019 from: https://metro.co.uk/2019/08/27/people-flock-search-engine-plants-trees-amazon-rainforest-fires-10639283/