To combat climate change, easy access to data about our emissions are necessary. One of the largest sources of emissions for many individuals is the emissions from flying.
The GoClimate Flight Emissions API calculates an approximation of the amount of CO₂-equivalents a flight emits per person.
We wanted to build the GoClimate.org Flight Emissions API to educate people searching for flights what the environmental impact is per person, and thereby enabling people to choose less environmentally damaging flights or ways of travel.
We have now offset another 25,000 ton CO2eq in a CDM and Gold Standard certified project!
Located in northern India, this large-scale, 50 MW-capacity solar thermal power project generates almost 119,000 MWh for India’s Combined Regional Grid, displacing electricity sourced from the burning of fossil fuels to reduce emissions and contribute to regional sustainable development.
India is the world’s second largest country by population, beaten only by China – and it is rapidly catching up. As its developing economy strengthens further and rapid population growth continues, India’s energy needs are rising. While the share of renewables in India’s energy mix is growing, coal still accounts for over half of its electricity production.
Located in Jaisalmer District in North India’s Rajasthan State, this large-scale solar thermal power project helps satiate India’s growing energy demands. The 50 MW-capacity solar thermal plant uses parabolic trough technology to generate almost 119,000 MWh of clean energy for the Combined Regional Grid annually, further diversifying India’s electricity mix away from fossil fuels.
On top of supplanting fossil fuels with clean electricity to reduce emissions, the project proponent commits 2% of Carbon Emission Reduction (CER) sales to community welfare and sustainable development projects. The social benefits of this include local employment opportunities that alleviate regional poverty, as well as better roads and improved basic infrastructure. The project also contributes to the transfer of environmentally sound, state-of-the-art thermal solar power generation technology in India, and encourages further technology development.
A lot of what I will write here on this blog will hit home and will hit you hard. It will bring up things that you probably do, either with or without knowledge of its environmental effect. And I want you to know that this is not to judge anyone, but simply to share facts, ideas and tips. I understand that you can’t do it all.
I understand that some changes are either very hard to make or in some cases basically impossible.
Whether it’s for health, economical or in other ways hard for you to change I just want you to be more aware of your actions and make your choices from a place of deeper understanding of the backgrounds and the consequences, rather than blindingly do what we’ve “always” done.
Because the harsh truth is that our house, the earth, is metaphorically on fire. We can’t keep acting like we have and still are. We need to make drastic changes. And it will be hard. It will mean sacrifices. But we don’t have any other choices. People have already and are currently – dying from the effects of climate change. And it will only get worse.
I also want to point out that most of these posts, if not all, are directed towards the privileged who are living way above a sustainable lifestyle above 2 tons/year.
And while it’s largely because of the society in which we live, we still need to strive to lower our impact as much as possible.
My hope is that you will read this with an open mind and not take it hard or as direct criticism. We all make mistakes and things we can’t fully endorse. Be open to the fact that you’ve made mistakes and don’t beat yourself up about it and instead try to do better from now on. We can’t change what we’ve done in the past, but how we act from the knowledge and insightfulness.
Cause what is life if we don’t evolve and learn from our mistakes and move forward more enlightened?!
So prepare for the ride.
It will be bumpy, it will be uncomfortable and you might want to jump off and just stand still – but we need to get there. We need to arrive to where we can slow down climate change and stay below 2 degrees, or as low as we possibly can.
Buckle up.
Evelina Utterdahl during one of her talks at Bournemouth University about Quitting Flying. Photographer: Roxanne Furman
To carbon offset a company is to take responsibility for the carbon emissions the company produces – and by doing that being part of stopping climate change.
How do I get started?
There’s two alternatives if you want to get started with your carbon offsetting with us at GoClimate:
Standardized calculations: The standard to calculate carbon emissions from a company is to follow the GHG-protocol (GHG is for Green House Gases). This is something all larger companies should do since it gives you a tool to see how large different emissions are and thereby a possibility to decrease emissions more effectively. Since it’s a standard it also makes it possible to compare your emissions with other companies in the same industry. If you want help with this, contact us at [email protected]
Simple calculation based on number of employees: The cons with GHG-calculations is that they are rather time consuming and therefore costly. To get more companies to take responsibility for their climate footprint we also offer a simpler way to take responsibility for your emissions. It’s based on the mean emissions for one person (11 tonnes CO2eq in Sweden) x a safety factor to be sure we don’t underestimate the emissions (we use a factor of 2) x the number of employees in your company. You can do the calculation here and contact us for more info: https://www.goclimate.com/business
It’s easy to take responsibility for your emissions and to be a part of the solution of climate change. It also has lots of other advantages for the region where the climate project is supported and for your company.
My name is Evelina Utterdahl and I will be blogging here at Go Climate Neutral from now on.
I thought an introduction would be suitable so that you know a little bit more about who’s behind the thoughts and words to come.
Picture from Tbilisi, Georgia in June 2018 to where I went from Iran through Armenia, before traveling back towards Europe. All without flying.
Born and raised in the west of Sweden and I travel full time since 2,5 years and basically everything I do has some relation to sustainability and how to fight global warming.
I do talks at events, schools or organisations of which most of them are about sustainable travel, and how to travel without flying.
Social media is also kinda my thing, and I post on my own account @earthwanderess as well as being the coordinator of the international Instagram account for Extinction Rebellion. I also do the instagram for @vihallerosspajorden who started the campaign Flight Free 2020 where I am also part of the board.
You can also expect me to be part of taking care of our Instagram account at @goclimateneutral.
A bit of background of to how I got here. It started off with me traveling a lot and with that experience started writing travel articles for an online site.
While I was aware of airplanes being bad for the environment, I had no comprehension of just how big of an impact it had. I learned the numbers while stumbling over an article and was horrified. I felt so fooled as the whole world was acting as if flying airplanes and traveling across the world for leisure was something that we could do. As if it wasn’t as bad as it actually is.
I decided to quit flying that day.
From the Swedish TV show PLUS in October 2018, where I came on and talked about how to travel sustainably
The realisation of how little information about the severity of the situation we’re in had me needing to dig deeper and find out as much as I possibly could to lower my individual impact as well as use my rather big platform on social media to spread the knowledge I collected.
I am very excited to be able to come here on this platform on Go Climate Neutral, to reach a new audience where I can share all the thoughts and information that I pick up on a daily basis.
I hope you will learn new things and hopefully that my posts will also enable you to start conversations with friends, family and colleagues.
If you have any ideas of topics you’d like me to bring up, or if you have any feedback for my posts please feel free to send me a message at:
We have for the second time invested in the Gold Standard-certified CDM-project Nanyang Danjiang River Solar Cooker Project and contributed to preventing 15 000 ton of CO2 from reaching the atmosphere. Thank you so much everyone for contributing to a cleaner and greener future!
The Nanyang Solar Project improves the indoor hygiene and living conditions of 48,000 rural households in one of the poorest regions in China. By replacing traditional coal-fired cooking stoves with clean solar cookers – CO2-emissions are reduced and the quality of life of 48,000 rural household are improved.
In the rural area of Xichuan County, Henan Province it is estimated that 76.4% of local households use coal-fired stoves as the main energy source for their daily lives. Not only do these coal stoves create harmful carbon emissions, but the large amount of wood and coal fuel they require is in dwindling supply.
The Nanyang Danjiang Solar Cooker Project enables these rural households to substitute traditional coal stoves for a solar energy alternative. 48,000 of these stoves have been distributed to seven towns in the Xichuan County, Henan Province. They are 50% more efficient than traditional coal stoves and, with an energy capacity of 876.5 W per unit, displace the CO2 that would have been generated by the fossil fuel consumption of coal fires.
With access to solar cooker methods, local residents now have a cleaner, practical and more efficient way to meet the energy demand of their daily cooking. By switching to solar power, health issues related to the excess soot and indoor smoke-pollution of coal fires have been abated. The solar cookers are distributed and maintained by the project for free, and because they no longer have to purchase coal fuel, villagers can use the money saved to buy things that improve their standard of living.
We have now offset another 15000 ton CO2eq in a CDM and Gold Standard certified project! A big thank you to all our more than 2400 users for making this possible!
We have offset via the Za Hung Hydropower project before, you can read about that time here. Za Hung Hydropower is a small scale hydropower project situated at the A Vuong River in the Quang Nam province, in the South Central region of Vietnam. With an electricity generation of 114,079 MWh per year, the plant contributes to bridging the supply-demand gap in the region and improves the livelihoods of local communities where minority ethnic groups live.
We have now offset another 15 000 ton CO2eq in another CDM and Gold Standard certified project! A big thank you to all our more than 2300 users for making this possible!
The Bangna Starch Wastewater Treatment and Biogas Utilization Project takes care of harmful and odorous methane emissions from wastewater. The methane have been cleverly repurposed to generate biogas energy at a Cassava starch plant in the Kalasin Province. This has greatly improved the air quality in the area, and created new training and job opportunities for local workers.
Embedded in the forests at the foot of the Phu Pan hills, the Kalasin Province region is typified by agriculture. The growth and processing of Cassava starch is a huge aspect of the economy here. However these starch processing factories place significant strain on the environment, requiring a high demand of water for washing the cassava, with pungently odoured methane emissions and high fossil fuel reliance. The Bangna Biogas Project neatly addresses all of these environmental issues by replacing the old cascading open anaerobic lagoon treatment system with a modern Upflow Anaerobic Sludge Blanket (UASB) reactor system. It captures biogas from plant wastewater that would have previously been emitted into the atmosphere, instead using it to replace fossil fuels to generate electricity which is then exported to the national grid. In addition to this, the treated wastewater can now be recycled and used for cleaning the cassava, which saves many tonnes of fresh water per day.
For the local community, the air quality has improved vastly, special training opportunities have been provided and several permanent jobs created to operate and maintain the biogas facilities.
UN Sustainable Development Goals that the project also contributes to:
Treated wastewater can be recycled for washing cassava
8800 MWh of clean electricity is generated yearly
22 permanent jobs created including 15 from the local area
We have now offset another 15 000 ton CO2eq in a CDM and Gold Standard certified project! A big thank you to all our more than 1800 users for making this possible!
The Enercon Wind Farm (Hindustan) Ltd project installs and manages wind turbines with a total effect of 68,8 MW in Karnataka, India. The climate benefit comes from replacing fossil intense energy (73.46 % of all energy in India comes from fossil fuels) with the renewable energy from the wind turbines.
UN Sustainable Development Goals that the project also contributes to:
The project reduces the burning of coal which means that fewer for humans harmful substances. are released in the atmosphere.
The project contributes to the economic development in the region by creating local job opportunities during installation and operation, as well as construction of roads.
The project reduces emissions of nitrogen oxides, sulfur and particulates from the combustion of fossil fuels.
We have now offset another 10,000 ton CO2eq in a CDM and Gold Standard certified project!
Located in northern India, this large-scale, 50 MW-capacity solar thermal power project generates almost 119,000 MWh for India’s Combined Regional Grid, displacing electricity sourced from the burning of fossil fuels to reduce emissions and contribute to regional sustainable development.
India is the world’s second largest country by population, beaten only by China – and it is rapidly catching up. As its developing economy strengthens further and rapid population growth continues, India’s energy needs are rising. While the share of renewables in India’s energy mix is growing, coal still accounts for over half of its electricity production.
Located in Jaisalmer District in North India’s Rajasthan State, this large-scale solar thermal power project helps satiate India’s growing energy demands. The 50 MW-capacity solar thermal plant uses parabolic trough technology to generate almost 119,000 MWh of clean energy for the Combined Regional Grid annually, further diversifying India’s electricity mix away from fossil fuels.
On top of supplanting fossil fuels with clean electricity to reduce emissions, the project proponent commits 2% of Carbon Emission Reduction (CER) sales to community welfare and sustainable development projects. The social benefits of this include local employment opportunities that alleviate regional poverty, as well as better roads and improved basic infrastructure. The project also contributes to the transfer of environmentally sound, state-of-the-art thermal solar power generation technology in India, and encourages further
