Canadians not fooled by bogus carbon neutrality, study says

Canadians are apparently not fooled by companies who claim to be "carbon neutral" but carry on with usual, un-green practices. According to online research commissioned by Markets Initiative of Vancouver and conducted by Pollara Research, only one per cent of Canadians say they strongly trust companies’ claims that their products or practices are carbon neutral, while 57 per cent of Canadians say they do not.

The study (details of which are available on the MI website) is part of a larger report to be released in full next week, intended to reflect market trends and environmental integrity in the paper and publishing industries. Markets Initiatives is an advocacy organization the campaigns for environmental stewardship and has had a major role in encouraging Canadian magazines to adopt ancient forest friendly paper.

Nicole Rycroft, executive director of Markets Initiative, said in a release:

“A proliferation of companies are using ‘carbon neutral’ schemes to buy their way into consumers’ hearts without taking steps to actually reduce carbon, which is what the planet needs. The good news is that these big claims with little action are not convincing Canadian consumers.”

She added part of the consumer distrust arises because companies often pay for offsets but continue business as usual. Although there is a lot of conjecture about the term ‘carbon neutral’, it was the New Oxford American Dictionary’s Word of the Year for 2006. It refers to zero total carbon released by balancing the amount of carbon released with the amount sequestered or offset. However, there is no standard body governing carbon neutral claims, which makes
credible accounting difficult.

The release said companies like Air Canada and organizations like The Vatican have launched high profile marketing initiatives about their offsetting programs in tree planting with seemingly little other concrete action. The science is doubtful about the efficacy of tree planting offsets, as the carbon loss that results from logging carbon rich old growth forests such as Canada’s Boreal forest is not offset by planting seedlings, even after decades.

Likewise, Rolling Stone magazine announced in 2007 that it was the first magazine to use carbon neutral paper. This was in spite of the fact the paper itself lacked any low carbon features like recycled content and consisted only of 100 per cent virgin fibre. In this case, the claim of ‘carbon neutral’ accounted only for energy reduction measures at the mill and offsets purchased for the energy used to produce the paper.

The online research polled 2,271 Canadians aged 18 and over. The survey was conducted from November 9th to November 13th, 2007. Results are considered accurate to ±2.1%, nineteen times out of twenty.