Carbon Neutrality and Offsetting

Carbon offsetting is usually one of the first and most accessible strategies companies come across with regard to addressing their carbon emissions. Through offsetting businesses can compensate for historic greenhouse gas emissions by investing in projects that capture, or mitigate the release of, an equivalent amount of CO2. Example projects include renewable energy, reforestation, or carbon capture and storage. Companies may choose to back offsetting projects at any stage of their reduction journey, either whilst actively working to reduce their companies emissions or toward the end of their journey to help offset the environmental impact of activities that cannot be completely eliminated. 

It is important to understand that by offsetting companies are not reducing their actual greenhouse gas footprint and as such any offsets should not be netted off reported company emissions. The only way for a company to truly reduce their carbon footprint is by measuring emissions within a clear organisational boundary, setting a baseline against which to compare future emissions and identifying opportunities to engage with reduction initiatives, both internally and throughout the supply chain. 

In summary, offsetting, when done through verified and credible sources, can offer companies a great way to take responsibility for and address past emissions in the face of climate change. However, offsetting should not be viewed as a one stop solution. Instead, if opted for, offsets should be part of a multifaceted approach to sustainability - where companies are taking decisive action to reduce emissions and ultimately reduce any need for offsetting by eliminating future emissions potential.

How does offsetting lead to carbon neutrality?

In this rapidly evolving industry definitions on carbon neutral and carbon negative vary depending on who you ask and when. Essentially a company can claim it is carbon neutral when it has purchased an equivalent sum of carbon credits/offsets to their measured CO2e emissions in any 1 year, meaning the quantity of carbon being sequestered/stored by supported projects should equal the companies CO2e footprint. Similarly if a company purchases more than their measured emissions they could claim carbon negativity as more carbon is being sequestered through offsetting projects than is being emitted by the company, at Positive Planet to achieve our old carbon negative certification clients were required to offset 120% of their footprint.

Positive Planet no longer offers new Carbon Neutral or Negative certifications and is phasing these out with customers who have previously gone down this route, for more on why we have decided to transition away from certifying businesses please see our FAQs or read more about going beyond offsetting.