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Article tags: footprint, carbon, challenge

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Project aims:

The main aim of the project is to reduce the amount of carbon being released into the atmosphere by human activity and therefore reduce climate change.

The other aims are to:
- Give people the chance to reduce carbon by a significant amount, by engaging their friends and family as sponsors
- Engage people with their own carbon footprint - during the process of sponsoring a challenge, you are invited to donate a proportion of your footprint, which is measured through a survey
- Give people a whole load of information about what they can do to reduce their footprint

Project methods:

The project uses the simple model of charity challenges.

For example, traditionally, I would run the London Marathon to raise, say, £1000. Through Project Footprint, I could decide to raise 100 tonnes of carbon. I could set this amount against my footprint, or a part of it.

I would invite people to sponsor me. Someone would choose an amount to donate, say 5 tonnes, and this would be donated via a gold standard carbon off-setting scheme. The sponsor would still be making a financial donation, but it would be equivalent to an amount of carbon.

Project needs:

The project has start up funding from Unltd and a new website is being developed, so that people can start taking challenges by the summer.

SO, WHAT WE REALLY NEED ARE PEOPLE TO TAKE THE FIRST CARBON CHALLENGES EVER!!

We also need advice and ideas for the project....so what do you think?

Comments

27 Jun 07 21:19, by g!by this project sounds good and i like the aims. but im so confused, how do u give carbon and what good would it do? i bet the answer is really obvious and im very embaressed. but couls somebody explain?
Staff reply 28 Jun 07 11:07, by zw!tch Hia,

The idea of donating carbon is linked to schemes which do something called "carbon offsetting". The idea behind this is that if you do something which releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere (eg use a car or fly a lot) then you can pay a company to do something like plant trees which will remove the equivalent amount of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. There has been a lot of discussion about how effective these schemes are so the government has introduced something called a "gold standard" to try and show which of the carbon offsetting schemes reach particular standards .

There is some more information about this here:
http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/consumer/caring/article.html?in_article_id=416539&in_page_id=511

I think that it's important not to forget that the most important thing we should do is to reduce our emissions in the first place - but otherwise these schemes seem to be a good middle ground to try and limit the size of our carbon footprint!

One example of a scheme that meets the government's gold standard is PURE the clean planet trust: http://www.puretrust.org.uk

As to what good reducing our carbon footprints can do - there is a lot of info on the above website including what the human cost of climate change has been so far
http://www.puretrust.org.uk/ClimateChange/TheHumanCost.aspx

I hope that helps! Let us know if you want anything more explaining...

Zoë
28 Jun 07 12:01, by Nick Hi, thanks for taking an interest in the project! As Zoe says, its all about carbon offsetting. When people take a normal charity challenge they are sponsored by friends and family. With a carbon challenge, instead of just giving money to a charity, they offset some of their carbon footprint. This costs money, but the donation comes through as a weight of carbon.

There has been lots of criticism of carbon offsetting schemes and often with much good reason. Many of them are badly run and inefficient as a carbon exchange. Some just plant trees, which is a very poor way of exchanging carbon.

The other criticism, as Zoe mentions, is that it distracts from the main goal of reducing your emmissions. But this is something that I would disagree.

The aim of good (gold standard) offsetting projects is to invest in alternative energy resources in, mainly, developing countries. This investment is absolutely crucial. Even if Britain does turn off its lights and recycle its tin cans, it will only be a drop in the ocean of global emmissions. Developing economies, particularly, China and India, need investment in cleaner technologies...and loads and loads of it. Investment in offsetting schemes is a brilliant way of getting this investment.

The other point is that people don't like being nagged with heaps of quite complex demands. Do this, recycle that, don't do that, spend more on that even though its slower and more uncomfortable, shop there, don't fly, eat more leaves etc etc. In face of this nagging, people totally disengage from the environmental issue. Offsetting is a simple way of engaging people with the issue. To offset their carbon footprint, they have to measure it, which means that they can see what it is made up of. The best offsetting scheme are linked with advice on how to reduce your footprint.

Much of the criticism is made of big companies, who offset instead of reduce. But they haven't made a choice to either offset or reduce, because they will only reduce if they are given incentives, which is the government's job. In the meantime, offsetting at leasts shows a willingness to engage with the issue, even if its more fairly cynical PR reasons.

So, carbon challenges are a way of taking something 1.5million people do every year - take sponsored challenges - and channeling some of the £100,000,000+ thaty gets raised into alternative energy technologies in developing countries.
02 Oct 07 10:27, by Suze Hi Guys.

If these kind of articles are of interest to you maybe you'd like to sign up to be a volunteer campaigner for Oxfam? There are lots of opportunities to be had - you could be a festival campaigner, a political and media campaigner - or maybe even an enviromental champion? Lots of roles to suit your interests. Get in touch! Suzanne: ssaunter@oxfam.org.uk www.oxfam.org.uk
Staff reply 17 Oct 07 11:22, by zw!tch Hi Suze - funnily enough I'm already an oxfam outreacher! I volunteered at o2 wireless festival over the summer, helping collect signatures for the climate change campaign I had a great time, and it was a really simple and flexible way to take action! Anyone who wants to know more can have a look here: http://www.oxfam.org.uk/generationwhy/do_something/volunteer/outreach/

I'm in London by the way so if you sign up I might see you at an event soon!