Carbon offsetting at Zen: The reality behind the science

As you’re probably aware, Zen is a Carbon Neutral business, committed to being net zero by 2040, and so far that’s probably nothing you haven’t heard a thousand times before.

It’s all well and good extolling our virtues as a sustainable business, but statements like those on their own are pretty meaningless. So we’ve decided to delve a little deeper into the actual reality behind some of these grand statements, starting with carbon offsetting.

Carbon offsetting: What is it?

Carbon offsetting is a pretty simple idea in principle. To illustrate it, let’s use an example. Say a business is able to measure the amount of carbon generated/emitted directly through their activity. The idea is that this carbon could be ‘paid off’ through schemes that remove carbon from the atmosphere. So, X car company generates 100 tonnes of CO2 emissions in a month, and ‘offsets’ those emissions by investing in a tree-planting company to plant enough trees to offset 100 tonnes of carbon dioxide every month. The ‘net’ figure is then nil… good job!

In an ideal world, carbon offsetting isn’t as good as actually reducing the amount of carbon (or equivalent gases) emitted into the atmosphere, but it can be a good strategy to complement carbon reduction activities.

At Zen, we’re committed to doing our best to reduce our carbon emissions, something you can read more about in this article. But until businesses can conduct their activities in a completely carbon neutral way (much easier said than done), carbon offsetting will remain a hugely important part of any good sustainability strategy.

What are we doing?

We’re deeply committed to reducing the emissions we’re directly and indirectly responsible for, and that’s always going to be our number one objective in the long term. But Rome wasn’t built in a day, as they say, and we recognise the importance of carbon offsetting in the meantime.

We’ve been investing in carbon offsetting schemes for a number of years now, but this year we’ve decided to do even better. And the first part of doing better is to get help from businesses who specialise in this sort of thing.

And so, we’ve partnered with CEEZER, a specialist company that works with some of the world’s best-known businesses to help them implement effective carbon offsetting activities. With CEEZER’s help we’ll look to invest in a range of effective carbon offsetting schemes.

We’re committed to offsetting a total of 462 tCO2, which covers all our Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions and even some of our Scope 3 emissions. Here’s a quick jargon-buster in case those terms are new to you:

• Scope 1: The emissions that we have direct control over, like gas in our HQ and fuel usage of our vehicles.
• Scope 2: Emissions related to the generation and purchase of the electricity we use.
• Scope 3: Indirect emissions from activities not controlled by us - like the transportation and distribution of goods and even the types of energy our suppliers and customers use. 

We’ll achieve this 462 tCO2 figure through a combination of removal and reduction offsets:

• Removal offsets are those you might typically think of, such as the tree planting example above. The idea is that these offsets actively take carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and store it (trees absorb and store CO2, for example). Other types of carbon removal offset include carbon capture and direct air capture.
• Reduction offsets focus on preventing future emissions from happening. This type of offsetting might include investing in renewable energy projects or protecting forests from being cut down (which would release stored carbon). 

Our plan for the year ahead is to achieve approximately three-quarters of our target through reduction offsets and the rest through removal. Keep an eye out for updates in the coming months!

How you can help

One of the most important aspects of our journey to net zero is simply raising awareness. It’s not a target that we’ll ever be able to achieve totally by ourselves. Even if we eliminate all the emissions that we’re directly responsible for, we will always be reliant on other businesses and even consumers to help us wipe out those Scope 3 emissions.

And that’s why we’d make an appeal to all our readers - whether you’re running a business, or you’re only responsible for your own personal carbon emissions - to look for ways to act sustainably wherever possible, to find environmentally conscious suppliers and providers for your goods and services, and to spread the word that this is a difficult challenge, but one that we can achieve if we all work together.