180 / 202
KICK THE HABIT
THE CYCLE – OFFSET
180
tainability concerns and take place in South Africa, the host country of the
FIFA World Cup in 2010. For compensating the GHG emissions two Gold
Standard CDM projects were selected to offset emissions of the world’s
largest sport event: a fuel-switching project in the Limpopo Province, and a
biogas project in the Johannesburg area.
The main concerns are whether buying credits will actually produce results,
and whether customers and other stakeholders will be impressed, there-
fore purchasing high quality offsets will most likely yield highest benefits
although their prices may be higher. But the benefits of showing leader-
ship on climate change may appear to balance out the worries. Even small
organizations wield considerable economic clout, which means they can
influence the offset projects they choose by bringing far more money to
bear than an individual offsetter.
LARGER ORGANIZATIONS
For companies that are required by law to compensate extra emissions it
makes most sense to purchase offsets from the compliance market. This
is for example the case for the more than 10 000 plants for power genera-
tion, iron and steel, glass, cement, pottery and bricks across Europe that
fall under the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU-ETS). For others the act
of offsetting emissions from their entire operations, or part of them, is
voluntary but often has a lot of benefits. However, companies do need to
remember the insistence of the critics that emissions must be reduced, not
just offset, otherwise offsetting becomes a form of “greenwash.” Offsets
are just one part of a corporate climate strategy, chosen after all possible
reductions have taken place.
Since larger organizations naturally tend to have more emissions, they
might consider other options for offsetting them, mainly because they may
be able to get better offers by being a large investor. As shown in the EasyJet
example earlier in the text, when you are able to buy considerable amounts,
offsets can also be purchased directly from project developers or market-
places where they trade their emission reductions. This will save you from
paying the overheads of all the brokers that handle the offsets between the
project and the retailer.