Product claims regarding carbon neutrality based on offsets are controversial, but better accounting of carbon footprints is on the way
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Coffee labelled as zero-carbon being prepared during the Boao Forum for Asia 2022 in Hainan, southern China (Image: Guo Cheng / IMAGO / Alamy)
As you sit in a carbon-neutral building, drinking a carbon-neutral coffee with carbon-neutral milk and munching on your carbon-neutral mooncake, you open your carbon-neutral computer and arrange the delivery of a package to a carbon-neutral locker. Then you walk to your car, powered by a carbon-neutral battery, and drive to the airport for your carbon-neutral flight to a carbon-neutral event … But are you really being carbon neutral?
“Carbon neutrality” is achieved when the CO2 released into the atmosphere by an activity is successful balanced out by an equivalent removal of CO2. If an individual, company or country can take as much CO2 out of the atmosphere as they put in, they are carbon-neutral.
The term has become a buzzword in China, with many “carbon-neutral” products following. But the label and statements about it have come under fire. Are the claims being made on such products genuine, or just greenwashing?
Other countries have been taking action: in June, Canada passed a law preventing companies from making unfounded environmental claims, including dubious ones of carbon neutrality; back in March, the EU sent an even clearer message, banning all environmental claims based on greenhouse gas offsetting.
China’s carbon-neutral products all claim that status based on offsets. Products or services have long been able to get carbon neutrality certification from environmental-testing institutions, certification providers and industry associations. But in April this year, the government banned the use of certain words, such as “verified”, in carbon certification.
