A Climate-Neutral Event

• It is easily accessible by public transport, which reduces the need for commuting with CO₂-emitting private vehicles.

2. Hosting a hybrid event:

The action day was carried out based on an innovative hybrid concept. This means that although there was a physical venue at the MAK, most speakers, experts, companies and their employees joined via live stream. This is particularly interesting in terms of reducing mobility needs and the associated CO₂ emissions. In fact, this format avoids unnecessary commuting for all employees from another part of Austria or abroad.

3. Vegetarian food at the venue:

• Meat consumption continues to be an issue, as livestock farming contributes significantly to greenhouse gas emissions. Therefore, our audience at the venue was offered a wide variety of delicious vegetarian and vegan dishes.
• In addition, many of the companies participating in the Climate Impact Day encouraged their employees to make the day a meat-free day, or even made their canteens vegetarian for the day.

4. Waste management system:

For the offline event, we used the MAK's efficient waste management system. We also encouraged the participating companies to take measures to reduce waste by sending them a guideline of actions for hosting the Climate Impact Day in their offices.

What was the actual carbon footprint of the Climate Impact Day?

Although we received the Green Meeting certification, it was important for us to assess the impact of our reduction measures and gain insights into the carbon footprint of our event. On the one hand, in order to be able to offset unavoidable emissions. On the other hand, to reduce our emissions next time and keep our promise of climate neutrality.

The process for calculating the carbon footprint of the Climate Impact Day is divided into four categories:

1. Identifying the relevant data,
1. Collecting data,
1. Calculating the footprint, and
1. Interpreting the data.

Taking into account all relevant activities and including scopes 1-3, the Climate Impact Day 2021 caused less than one tonne of CO2 emissions. In total, 970 kg of CO2 emissions were generated.

If you are not familiar with the scopes, you can find more information on the website of the greenhouse gas protocol.

Since we want to continuously improve the carbon footprint of our events, we analysed where these emissions come from:

It turns out that the venue and mobility are the main contributors to the carbon footprint of the action day. This may come as a surprise, considering that it was a hybrid event with a careful and climate-conscious choice of venue.

But... how big would the carbon footprint of an action day have been that took place completely offline without the reduction measures carried out beforehand? If all speakers had been on site, and instead of video streaming and meat meals we had offered to our audience, the carbon footprint would have been four times as high! And that's quite a lot...

Offsetting our remaining emissions

In line with our promise to be climate neutral from day one, we decided to offset our remaining emissions through high-quality compensations. We decided to over-compensate the emissions of our event by 20% and bought 1.2 tonnes of offsets allocated to the following projects in the patch.io portfolio:

• Husk Biochar: This carbon-based fertiliser project not only sequesters carbon from the air, but also improves the quality of the soil!
• Kenya International Small Group Tree Planting (TIST): This reforestation project is based in Kenya and certified with the Gold Standard.
• GreenSand: This method of carbon removal has the great advantage of permanently sequestering carbon!

How can you host a climate-neutral event?

As a company, you probably host several internal or external events every year. By hosting green or climate-neutral events, you not only reduce your overall carbon footprint, but you can also gain an advantage over your competitors or impress your employees.

Don't know where or how to start making your event climate neutral? No need to worry! We have put together a list of measures you can implement to reduce the climate impact of your company's events:

1. Include carbon reduction in the planning of your event:

• Analyse past events: You can examine previous events by finding out where most of the emissions come from: mobility, food, venue...
• Follow the guidelines of an eco-label: This not only allows you to certify your event, but also to trigger emission reduction measures that you can implement before and during your event. In Austria, the Austrian Ecolabel offers a detailed framework for reducing the footprint of your events. At an international level, the ISO 20121 guideline for sustainable events can be a valuable reference here.

2. Calculate the carbon footprint of your event:

• Identify and collect the necessary data: Estimating the carbon footprint requires the collection of data before and during the event in order to be able to carry out the calculation.
• Identify the main sources of emissions: Calculating the carbon footprint of your event helps you to estimate the impact of your emission reduction measures and to understand where to focus your actions for the next event.

3. Offset the remaining emissions:

• Only offset unavoidable emissions!
• Buy high-quality offsets: There are many ways to support offset projects to compensate for emissions, but only a few of them are helpful in mitigating climate change. To avoid pitfalls, make sure that the offset projects are certified according to recognised standards.

If you would like to host a climate-neutral event but are unsure how to implement emission reduction measures in your company or calculate your carbon footprint, then Glacier is here for you!