Greenhouse Gases and Marketing: Synthesis

The proliferation of greenhouse gases (GHG) - and specifically carbon dioxide –
both in the media and the atmosphere – is a ubiquitous issue at the moment. This
article will provide product and brand managers a concise overview of the GHG
landscape, with the objective of identifying the issues and levers most critical
to their work.

A warming planet will cause enormous environmental and
climactic problems for large swaths of the world’s population – especially the
poorer ones who live at sea level, or who are subject to the whims of changing
weather patterns for their livelihood. GHGs – both natural and man-made –
contribute to the “greenhouse effect”, or global warming. Naturally occurring
greenhouse gases include water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide,
and ozone. Certain human activities, however, add to the levels of most of these
naturally occurring gases. (Source: EPA report on climate change).

Much
ink is currently being spilled on carbon dioxide (CO2). There is good reason for
this, as man-made carbon is the cause of the recent rises in the planet’s
average temperature – both directly, by warming the surface of the earth, and
indirectly, but releasing more water vapor into the atmosphere (water vapor is
the most important GHG but also the most difficult to reduce independently –
source Environmental News Network). Even worse, emissions of CO2 look set to
increase at ever greater rates. The proverbial CO2 tide needs to be turned
before literal tides wreak true havoc on the world’s coastal populations.

Two approaches are generally proposed and used by many of our clients to
deal with CO2 emissions: offsetting and reduction.

Carbon offsetting
involves individuals or organizations reducing their net carbon emissions by
paying someone else to either reduce existing emissions somewhere else or take
CO2 out of the atmosphere. The individual or organization continues to emit CO2
as before, but pays to decrease CO2 emissions elsewhere. Offsetting takes a
number of forms: tree planting, avoided deforestation, clean / renewable energy
and energy conservation.

Tree planting is one of the most oft-used
methods, but is also one of the most controversial. Simply put, planting trees
probably doesn’t reduce CO2 levels in the atmosphere in the long run. There are
two reasons for this: new forests often release significant amounts of CO2 into
the atmosphere when they’re planted. Second, when trees are cut down they
release all of the CO2 they have “trapped” back into the atmosphere. There’s no
net reduction for offsetters.

The other forms of offsetting are also
mooted. Avoided deforestation means paying someone to leave standing trees
alone, so that the trees continue to absorb CO2. Paying an industrial company to
reduce their CO2 emissions, or paying fellow consumers to use clean or renewable
energy, are also options that individuals and organizations can choose. All of
these have potential to reduce overall CO2 emissions, but there is no consensus
that they do, nor are there agreed standards on how to verify that the promised
reductions actually happen.

The second approach in dealing with CO2
emissions is reduction of one’s own emissions. Switching to renewable energy,
using less energy in the home and corporate operations, driving and flying less,
producing less waste and recycling more are some of ways that companies and
individuals can reduce their overall CO2 emissions

Many companies (GE,
Wal-Mart and Inocent are recent examples) are taking a rigorous approach to
reducing CO2 emissions – not only for the environmental benefits but also for
the clear cost savings and impact on profits. This involves auditing the
company’s current CO2 emissions across operations, identifying ways to reduce
them, setting reduction targets and communicating them.

For individuals,
a new scheme launched by Carbon Trust will make it easier for consumers to chose
products involving fewer emissions. A new “carbon footprint” label will show how
much CO2 was emitted in the production and transportation of the goods.

CO2 is not the end of the story. Other GHGs are also contributing to
global warming. Methane is another oft-mentioned culprit, and is much more
potent as a “global warmer” than CO2. Man-made methane emissions are the result
of some kinds of energy use (e.g. from natural gas fields), raising livestock,
processing rubbish and waste, and burning wood, peat and other forms of
“biomass”. Curbing these activities or finding ways to reduce the methane
produced will have a substantial impact on the amount of the world’s GHGs.