Climate change:the false solution of carbon credits, the pressures of industrial lobbies and large companies and Google's turning point

The weekly round-up on the climate crisis and data on carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.

For the first time since 2007, Google said it is no longer a carbon neutral company.In the last one environmental report, the technology giant has marked a turnaround in its climate strategy, essentially for two reasons:the development of the artificial intelligence sector, highly energy intensive, That it cost to Google a 48% increase in emissions (+13% only between 2022 and 2023);the decision to abandon the practice of purchasing carbon credits to offset the emissions produced.

To maintain the goal of climate neutrality by 2030, Google has decided to change its strategy and focus "on accelerating a series of solutions and partnerships for carbon emissions".This is an important turning point because it is the first time that a large company has renounced the compensation of emissions produced through the acquisition of carbon credits.

Carbon offsetting is the difference between the amount of greenhouse gases emitted by a company and the carbon credits calculated based on investments made in green projects or technologies.Every ton of carbon absorbed from the atmosphere through these projects constitutes a carbon credit (or carbon offset) that is subtracted from the share of greenhouse gases emitted.To be sure that these credits are legitimate, they must be approved by independent groups (such as Verra or Gold Standard), whose job is to ensure that the projects evaluated actually have a positive impact on the environment.Carbon neutrality is achieved when the carbon footprint is zero.

However, several climate scientists consider this practice a false solution to combating climate change:indeed, in some ways, it almost represents an authorization to pollute for those who can economically afford to purchase carbon quotas.

According to a five-year analysis of the British site Carbon Brief – who developed a detailed map of impacts of projects related to carbon offsetting – from fossil fuel producers to automotive or technology companies, about two thirds of the largest companies in the world compensate for their climate-altering activities every year by disbursing large sums of money to finance investments and projects with dubious impacts and which - as many investigations have shown - sometimes mask real scams.

In 70% of the cases analyzed around the world, these projects had negative impacts on the local communities of the territories receiving the investments.Often it involves land grabs, trampled workers' rights, forced displacements, as in the case of the removal of indigenous populations from their lands in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Amazon, Kenya, Malaysia and Indonesia.Last year The Guardian had told of a Chinese compensation project in which giants such as British Petroleum and Spotify also invested, within which there was evidence of forced labor and violation of the human rights of the minority of Uighurs.But they are also there sexual abuse, as in the case of the Kasigau Corridor conservation project in Kenya.

Sometimes, these are real scam projects:in 43% of cases, he notes Carbon Brief, the compensation declared by companies far exceeded the actual ability of their projects to reduce emissions.An emblematic case reported by the British site is that of a Californian company that continued to sell shares relating to a forest protection program, while in the meantime the trees in question had been destroyed by fire.

In June a vast investigation by the Brazilian federal police identified “a criminal organization” which for over a decade would have sold carbon credits from illegally invaded areas for a total value of 34 million dollars (about 180 million reais).The police themselves have called the investigation "Operation Greenwashing" for what is believed to be the largest carbon credit scam in history.

One of the latest scandals, in chronological order, concerns compensation projects in Ivory Coast which also involved Microsoft.Second an investigation of the investigative journalism group Follow the Money, the company would have paid several million euros to compensate its activities to the Dutch bank Rabobank, which manages the carbon portfolios of several big partners.The problem, the journalists argue, is that the compensation paid handsomely by Microsoft would have no measurable impact.The impacts would be overestimated by up to 600% because, according to local sources in Ivory Coast, the bank would have sold credits that it had no right to claim:the trees linked to the project would have been planted anyway, beyond the project.

Tree planting in West Africa accounts for more than a third of the total credits the Dutch bank sells to businesses.Through satellite images, buyers can verify the number of trees grown in the areas indicated by Rabobank.Starting from these trees, the carbon that their trunks are able to store is calculated, which corresponds to the share of emissions "compensated" by companies.To certify the validity of satellite images, Rabobank offers field sampling tests:During one of these audits, the consultancy Preferred by Nature found that estimates for a planting project in Côte d'Ivoire were inflated by up to six times compared to those provided by the independent firm.

The green certifications purchased in China by most German oil companies also appear to be non-existent:in early July Germany was shocked by the 623 million euro fraud scandal.Once again, the subsidized projects are at the center of the investigators' investigations:while the alleged carbon credits obtained from the activities of plants that were actually antiquated were put to use (the inclusion of an abandoned chicken coop near Beijing among Shell's compensation investments is noteworthy), the companies that certified their validity produced false documents.

Among the scams reported by Follow The Money, there is also that of South Pole, the most influential climate consultancy company in the world, which for years has sold essentially invented emissions rights to hundreds of companies, including Gucci, Volkswagen and energy provider Greenchoice.The crux of the scandal is a forest conservation project in Zimbabwe, the largest of the company's assets, to which the emissions credits of large multinationals are linked.Credits whose sale generated tens of millions of euros for South Pole.  

Despite the progressive crumbling of the credibility of the carbon credit system, the industrial lobbies have not stopped and have actually begun to exert even stronger pressure.The case of what happened with is striking Science Based Target Initiative (SBTi), a global business organization that develops standards and tools for the decarbonization of business activities.Since its foundation in 2015, SBTi he always refused Carbon credits as a tool to earn climate goals.But when, between 2019 and 2021, the market exploded, growing six times, SBTi's position softened until it reached admit the purchase of credits to offset up to 10% of total emissions as long as they are invested in CO2 storage projects.

In 2023 the leap in quality, when Nigel Topping, former SBTi board member and top UN climate change champion, began lobbying for the brand to relax its rules.In an email dating back to 2023, Topping he wrote that he is "working with a group of market operators frustrated by the campaigns" - in his opinion media and ideological - "that are suppressing demand for carbon credits".And last year he developed a lobbying campaign, never came to light, to rebuild the reputation of the quota market, in which it participated extensively through ICE Benchmark Administration, a data agency that provides information to companies on carbon credits and which last year achieved profits for 16 million euros. 

The Bezos Earth Fund would also have invested 36 million euros for the same purpose: 25 million they were allocated, in 2022, to a project that was supposed to build greater consensus towards carbon credits; 11 million instead were spent in two initiatives aimed at improving the monitoring of the integrity of trade.In 2024, the same fund headed by Bezos, which is among the main financiers of the SBTi, sponsored a two-day meeting in London attended by the main operators in the carbon credit market.

The lobbying campaign must have hit the right spots, given that in April 2024, much to the dismay of the brand's employees and the resignation of Climate Action Network senior advisor Stephan Singer, a communication  of SBTi in which the extension of the compensation measure to the CO2 emissions produced along the company's production chain was envisaged:these are Scope 3 emissions, more difficult to reduce because they are linked to the entire supply chain, from the extraction of raw materials to the creation of a product.

The decision was deemed illegitimate by most of the company's technical consultants, who were not consulted despite the internal regulations requiring their involvement in the decisions.Among the most critical voices, Doreen Stabinsky, member of the technical council and professor of global environmental politics, who he contested the lack of transparency and the timing of the decision, which arrived earlier while the technical committee was still evaluating its effectiveness, are yet to be ascertained.As a confidential draft also indicates spread by Reuters, the studies carried out so far consider the compensation measures "largely ineffective".

The reaction of the employees softened SBTi's position and led to resignation of the CEO Luiz Amaral, requests in an open letter signed by the staff of the Target Validation Team, Target Operations Team, Technical, Communications, Impact and IT Department, and the heads of various departments, together with those of the entire Board of Directors.

Data on carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere

Preview image:Petra Wessman, CC BY-SA 2.0, go Flickr.com