In this era of a fast closing window of opportunity to limit the worst excesses of future climate heating, net zero greenwashing by companies is blossoming. Here’s how to spot and avoid it.
Let’s try and stick to the science, shall we?. It’s all we got. So before the questions we need to know how much carbon dioxide-equivalent gases we can emit into the atmosphere and get away with it?
The carbon clock is ticking
The carbon clock, showing the time left to limit global warming to 1.5°C on the side of a building in the South Korea.
The MCC Carbon Clock shows this, depending on whether you want to limit global warming to a maximum of 1.5°C or 2°C global average above pre-industrial levels, respectively. We are already at least 1.2°C above, so the former target is unlikely to be reached – we have just six years left to meet that.
When I last looked the remaining carbon budget was just over 1000 billion tons, or giga-tons (Gt) to limit the temperature to 2°C, which sounds a lot until you realise annual emissions of CO2 – from burning fossil fuels, industrial processes and land-use change – are estimated to be 42.2 Gt per year, which gives us 23.8 years, or until 2045.
That sounds a long way off, but will we be able to stand that much heating given how much chaos 1.2°C is already causing? Anyway, it’s not so far; we are halfway there if you start from the year 2000, not so long ago.
Assumptions
This calculation depends on whether there are no hidden tipping points. For example we don’t know at what point the melting of the ice caps or tundra becomes irreversible and accelerates in a positive feedback loop.
If a tipping point does kick in soon then this seemingly linear relationship between emissions and danger becomes unpredictable. After all we already know that the weather is chaotic in the scientific sense.
It depends on a number of other things as well, including if we carry on burning fossil fuels at the same rate. If we burn more we have less time, but if we burned less, we would have more time.
Similarly if we destroy more forests or plant more trees.
Promises, promises
The website Climate Action Tracker examines what countries have pledged to do compared to what they are actually doing and whether it matches what is required.
It says the real-world action based on present policies would only limit global heating to 2.7°C, based on the above linear scale.
The best case optimistic scenario, based on total implementation of all announced targets would keep global heating to 1.8°C. NB: this table is one year old. Credit: Climate Action Tracker.
Every day my inbox is bulging with emails from companies boasting about their net zero pledges, often made under pressure from consumers and legislation. This all sounds great until you look closer and find that many are too vague to be meaningful.
So here is your guide to detecting greenwash
Simply ask of all claims the following 7 questions:
- Is net zero clearly defined? (With a balance sheet covering all positive and negative emissions.)
- Are targets near in time? (If targets are a long way off, like 2050, bodies are likely to think they can carry on as normal for now and kick the can down the road.)
- Are they measuring progress? (Only frequent and regular monitoring can provide the necessary feedback loop to limit emissions.)
- Are they independently monitored? (Marking your own homework does not inspire confidence. Is the assessor trustworthy?)
- Is the activity of supply chains and customers included? (Companies can outsource emissions or supply inefficient goods and services and so cause pollution up or down the line.)
- Are all activities covered? (Some areas may be monitored/greened (and trumpeted loudly) while the others can carry on as normal.)
- Do they rely on carbon offsetting? (Carbon offsetting is unreliable. It’s great to plant trees for many reasons, but they can burn down or die, at which point they emit all the carbon they have saved. To properly offset, new renewable energy investment must not have happened anyway.)
If you’re creating your own organisation’s net zero policy these are also essential questions.
If the answer is yes to the first six and no to the last one then it is a good policy.
The One Planet Standard
An organisation using The One Planet Standard can guarantee this.
That’s because it is independently assessed, looks up and down the line, covers all bases, and is about continual improvement.
Assessors are trained to be friendly and forensic and to know what they are looking for.
We developed it precisely to avoid greenwashing. If you haven’t downloaded into yet, what are you waiting for? It is free to do so, after all.
GET THE ONE PLANET STANDARD HERE
The One Planet Standard is a tool we have developed for organisations of any size to help them manage the reduction of their ecological footprint to ‘one planet’.
It’s a helpful roadmap for organisational change that can be adopted by any type or size of organisation, whether public body, enterprise, corporate or community.
The Standard is backed by Jane Davidson, the architect of the Well-being of Future Generations Act in Wales, who calls it “an impressive tool to help people be confident in their emission reduction“, and Sophie Howe, Wales’ Future Generations Commissioner, who says:
“The Standard aligns and builds on my existing advice in the area of decarbonisation and enhancing nature resilience, and it can help not only the public sector but all organisations in Wales with practical actions towards meeting carbon emission and biodiversity targets.
“The Standard centres around the 5 ways of working and promotes long-term thinking; it is an easy-to-understand and useful tool that can help address the climate and nature emergencies, prevent the disaster we are currently heading towards and help ensure the well-being of our future generations and the planet.”
The key differences between this solution and most other systems for achieving sustainability are that:
- your actions must be measurable and objectively verifiable
- there is independent assessment, with an online tool
- your targets refer directly to operating within planetary limits, and
- you account for all of your impacts, positive and negative.
…otherwise it’s like trying to bale out a sinking boat with a colander!
The Standard is free to download and can be confidentially independently assessed by our partners Assessment Services Ltd. who have provided an online self-assessment tool.
Organisations can interpret the Standard’s requirements in a way that’s relevant to their activities.
We at the One Planet Centre can support you with training materials, case studies, solutions and advice. Both Assessment Services and ourselves have 30 years experience in our respective businesses.
Besides being independently assessed, the One Planet Standard will help organisations account for the entirety of the impacts of their activities, including social impacts.
Downloading it brings you two documents: the Standard itself and What It Means In Practice:
Costs and benefits
If you measure social & ecological costs & benefits to capture social value and natural value, as well as financial value, you can plan your activities to make yourself socially & environmentally net positive!
Why do it? We are used to thinking of costs and benefits as financial, desiring our cost-benefit balance sheet to be net positive.
But often the social and environmental costs and benefits of our activities get left off this balance sheet. This is largely why we have climate and nature emergencies.
The Standard explains how to account for all impacts, good and bad so you can be ‘net positive’. The tools that we can offer will help organisations to achieve this.
The Standard dovetails with the Sustainable Development Goals and the Well-being of Future Generations Act including its five ways of working.
It supports a process of continuous improvement.
Organisations set a timeline, with milestones, to reach a one planet footprint using measurement and verification tools.
The One Planet Standard is a tool we have developed for organisations of any size to help them manage the reduction of their ecological footprint to ‘one planet’.
It’s a helpful roadmap for organisational change that can be adopted by any type or size of organisation, whether public body, enterprise, corporate or community.
The Standard is backed by Jane Davidson, the architect of the Well-being of Future Generations Act in Wales, who calls it “an impressive tool to help people be confident in their emission reduction“, and Sophie Howe, Wales’ Future Generations Commissioner, who says:
“The Standard aligns and builds on my existing advice in the area of decarbonisation and enhancing nature resilience, and it can help not only the public sector but all organisations in Wales with practical actions towards meeting carbon emission and biodiversity targets.
“The Standard centres around the 5 ways of working and promotes long-term thinking; it is an easy-to-understand and useful tool that can help address the climate and nature emergencies, prevent the disaster we are currently heading towards and help ensure the well-being of our future generations and the planet.”
The key differences between this solution and most other systems for achieving sustainability are that:
- your actions must be measurable and objectively verifiable
- there is independent assessment, with an online tool
- your targets refer directly to operating within planetary limits, and
- you account for all of your impacts, positive and negative.
…otherwise it’s like trying to bale out a sinking boat with a colander!
The Standard is free to download and can be confidentially independently assessed by our partners Assessment Services Ltd. who have provided an online self-assessment tool.
Organisations can interpret the Standard’s requirements in a way that’s relevant to their activities.
We at the One Planet Centre can support you with training materials, case studies, solutions and advice. Both Assessment Services and ourselves have 30 years experience in our respective businesses.
Besides being independently assessed, the One Planet Standard will help organisations account for the entirety of the impacts of their activities, including social impacts.
Downloading it brings you two documents: the Standard itself and What It Means In Practice:
Costs and benefits
If you measure social & ecological costs & benefits to capture social value and natural value, as well as financial value, you can plan your activities to make yourself socially & environmentally net positive!
Why do it? We are used to thinking of costs and benefits as financial, desiring our cost-benefit balance sheet to be net positive.
But often the social and environmental costs and benefits of our activities get left off this balance sheet. This is largely why we have climate and nature emergencies.
The Standard explains how to account for all impacts, good and bad so you can be ‘net positive’. The tools that we can offer will help organisations to achieve this.
The Standard dovetails with the Sustainable Development Goals and the Well-being of Future Generations Act including its five ways of working.
It supports a process of continuous improvement.
Organisations set a timeline, with milestones, to reach a one planet footprint using measurement and verification tools.
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