We don’t carbon offset. That may seem like a controversial statement, in a world where carbon offsetting is the climate buzzword on everyone’s lips. The truth is, carbon offsetting doesn’t solve the problem of climate change.
Before we get in to why we don’t offset, let’s take a look at what carbon offsetting is.
What is Carbon Offsetting?
Put simply, Carbon Offsetting is a way for businesses to balance out their carbon footprint by investing in environmental projects such as tree planting. A business will initially calculate their carbon footprint before deciding how much carbon they need to offset to achieve carbon neutrality. They’ll then donate money to an accredited environmental charity. This is done through purchasing carbon credits, with the most popular accreditation being golden standard.
Why we don’t Offset
We won’t offset until we have reduced our carbon emissions to the lowest they can be through positive change in our processes. Once we have calculated our carbon emissions, we aim to build a comprehensive reduction strategy that will work toward reducing our carbon output across the board. We’ve already started this process, with our initial focus on reducing our waste output, with a goal of achieving 80% recycling to 20% general waste.
Committing to becoming a single-use cup free roastery, reducing single-use plastic in our on-the-go lunches, composting our used coffee grounds, donating our chaff to community gardening projects, recycling our coffee sacks, switching to re-usable tubs for local coffee orders and delivering local orders by bicycle, are all steps that we’ve taken so far to reduce our carbon emissions.
We already have a strategy in place to give back through 1% for the Planet and giving 1% to local grassroots projects that benefit social justice and the climate. Doing this ensures that the money we donate benefits projects which are directly linked to the industry and the local community that we are part of.
There is currently no regulatory system in place to ensure quality when it comes to accredited offsetting schemes, with many schemes overestimating their impact.
The goal for us has always been to keep our emissions to a minimum.
Offsetting: It’s not all Bad
If you’ve read the rest of this article you might think that we’re denouncing offsetting as a bad thing, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Offsetting can be good, as part of a progressive carbon reduction strategy. It would be impossible for use to achieve NetZero by 2030 without offsetting in some capacity. However, it is our belief that collectively we must work together to reduce our carbon emissions as a whole, using offsetting to compliment these efforts.
Check out our impact page to find out about the positive work we’re doing to look after people and the planet.
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