Offsetting Strategy
Helping your transition to net zero
As demand on organisations to decarbonise operations and implement net-zero strategies intensifies, businesses are actively seeking ways to reduce their emissions. Robust carbon offsetting strategies can be used to support an organisation’s transition to net zero.
What is carbon offsetting?
Carbon offsetting is a practice that allows individuals, businesses, and organisations to compensate for their greenhouse gas emissions by investing in projects or activities that reduce or remove an equivalent amount of emissions elsewhere.
Offsetting activities are said to benefit the planet regardless of where emissions have taken place because these gases are widespread. Once the offsetting activity has achieved enough carbon reduction that it equals the total carbon footprint of the original emission producing activity, the activity is considered ‘carbon neutral’. Some common examples of carbon offsetting include: reforestation, renewable energy projects, waste to energy projects and energy-efficiency improvements.
Compliance and voluntary carbon markets
The compliance carbon market, also called the mandatory market, is used by those organisations who are legally required to offset their emissions.
On the other hand, the voluntary carbon market is exactly that, voluntary. Private investors, governments, non-governmental organisations, and businesses can voluntarily purchase carbon offsets to counteract their emissions.
Why use carbon offsetting strategies?
Carbon offsetting can be used alongside ambitious decarbonisation goals, to support an organisation on their transition to net zero. Offsetting alone will not tackle climate change but should rather form part of a larger plan to cut emissions.
Poor quality carbon offset projects might be doing more harm than good if they aren’t permanent or additional. That’s why it’s so crucial to undertake a thorough selection process to select carbon offsetting projects which are unique, additional and have a genuine climate impact.
How we can help with your carbon offsetting strategy
When done properly, offsetting your company’s carbon emissions can be hugely beneficial to your sustainability journey. We can help you with your carbon offsetting strategy as part of your wider transition to decarbonising your operations.
- We demystify – as well as explaining the technical details of offsetting, we support clients to ensure offsets are carefully calculated, selected and publicly disclosed to avoid any reputational risk.
- We support selection – we can advise on recognised offsetting frameworks; we can assess offsets against industry recognised quality criteria. Offsets often have numerous co-benefits, e.g. social or environmental advantages beyond GHGs. We can help clients choose to purchase offsets which align with their core values.
- We help with future strategy – we can help clients develop an internal carbon price, the benefits of which include: The removal of cost as a factor when purchasing offsets, which tends to lead to high quality offsets; enabling a “transition fund” which can be used to support alternative projects which contribute to net-zero (e.g. community energy schemes, local authority projects, supporting developing schemes which are not yet sufficiently developed to provide offsetting credits).
Want to learn more?
Get in touch today to speak to one of our experienced consultants about developing a carbon offsetting strategy
Related Services
Carbon Pricing
We can develop your bespoke internal carbon pricing strategy incorporate the cost of carbon into investment decisions, budgeting and project planning.
Net Zero Roadmap
Our net zero roadmaps are aligned with climate science and standards, on a full scope 1, 2 and 3 baseline.
