For Vandenbergh, no carbon labels have become dominant, which presents an opportunity for Climate Neutral. But they vary on their focus, from recognition of responsible composting to eliminating animal testing. Ecolabel Index, a tracker of these tags, says that there are 456 in 199 countries. And the immediacy of offsets is essential, “to minimize the risk that you get to 2040, and there’s simply no way to supply the level of mitigation that needs to happen.”
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“Companies will tell you, ‘we’ll get to net zero by 2040,’ but they do not know how to do that,” he says. Still, Whitman says offsets are essential, especially at this early stage, because it’s usually not possible to reach net zero with future reductions alone. He likes that it considers the entire supply chain (what Whitman calls “cradle-to-consumer emissions”), noting that, for many companies, the majority of emissions come from early in the chain. He notes that a common trap other labels fall into is too heavy a reliance on offsetting, but that Climate Neutral makes a dedicated effort to focus on future carbon reduction plans. “Doing something now is better than the perfect solution several years from now,” he says. Michael Vandenbergh, professor and director of the Climate Change Research Network at Vanderbilt University Law School, who coauthored a paper on carbon labeling systems earlier this year, values Climate Neutral’s approach, particularly its urgency. Steve Wolf, the brand’s vice president of marketing, says it chose Climate Neutral because it’s “a leading authority in the environmental space that aligned with our sustainability goals.” Whitman would like to one day partner with the entire Anheuser-Busch company, which aims to achieve net zero by 2040. The beer brand will be the company’s first zero-carb beer and its first net-zero beer. A recent brand to join is Bud Light Next Anheuser-Busch will be the group’s first Fortune 500 company partner. So far, Climate Neutral has certified 294 companies, 80% domestic and 20% abroad, including Allbirds, Kickstarter, Klean Kanteen, and REI so far measuring and offsetting 1,077,544 tonnes of carbon. They must reapply annually, to reflect the group’s yearly updated criteria (for 2023, for example, it will bar the use of crypto credits). Then, they must show how they will reduce their carbon footprints over the next 18 to 24 months. Companies must detail their complete emissions for the past year, across the supply chain, and how they are offsetting those emissions, whether through carbon credit programs, power purchase agreements, or renewable energy certificates. Though it’s one of many private eco-labels, experts say its approach stands out, and that exerting its dominance from the bunch would help customers build trust in the system.Įarning the certification requires a process that takes about four months. The reward: a product label that consumers can view when they shop. The organization, Climate Neutral, of which Whitman is CEO, certifies small and large businesses that prove they’re offsetting their carbon-and, crucially, also ensures that they have set out a carbon reduction plan for the future.
His answer in 2019 was to cofound a nonprofit that would support companies in meeting their carbon emission reduction goals. The policy gap has left “this huge enormous hole in how we’re going to actually reduce emissions.” “Whether climate policy does or does not happen at the federal level to me is, at this point, somewhat moot,” he says. For a long time, Austin Whitman has been disappointed by a lack of meaningful climate policy action from the federal government.