Carbon neutral, carbon footprint

Carbon neutral

Carbon neutrality refers to the aim of compensating for (or offsetting) the greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, emitted into the atmosphere from a household or business with the absorption of an equivalent amount of greenhouse gas by planting trees or by preventing emissions in the first place by funding renewable energy projects.

One of the first organisations to declare that it wanted to achieve carbon neutrality was one of the world’s largest banks, HSBC. It announced in 2004 that it would spend millions of dollars over the next decade to minimise its contribution to climate change. What the bank is doing is starting to balance its greenhouse gas emissions by buying offsets from projects that absorb greenhouse gases or prevent their creation. These can be projects such as reforestation, building new wind farms, capturing and using methane from landfills, installing solar systems and so on. In reality, the bank is voluntarily purchasing carbon offsets within what has become to be known as the voluntary carbon market.

One of the concerns with the carbon offsetting approach is that people or organisations will simply increase their emissions and purchase offsets only for the increased portions. In other words, offsetting becomes a way of assuaging guilt for continuing business as usual. In this case, offsetting does nothing to actually reduce emissions and address climate change.

To really make a difference, organisations have to purchase enough offsets to REDUCE their overall emissions. This could be very expensive with the cost of carbon offsetting being passed on to the end consumer.

The only legitimate approach to achieving carbon neutrality is to first take action to reduce emissions as much as possible and then buy offsets for the rest. In practice this means initiating energy saving and efficiency measures first, such as driving and flying less, using less energy for heating, cooling and lighting, recycling more, using public transport more, purchasing more efficient cars for the company fleet, and so on. Using clean alternative energy sources will also reduce emmissions. Any remaining emissions can then be balanced out by buying quality offsets from legitimate sources.