The following contribution appears courtesy of Nick Rosen, Off-Grid.net.  Nick is currently writing Off-Grid America and looking for amazing off-grid people - including people who are successful in  their own field of expertise other than environment. Contact him via nick@off-grid.net


Dickinson: must fly - planet to saveThe Carbon Disclosure Project is a self congratulatory group of rich and powerful companies whose combined carbon consumption is off the scale.

The corporate CEOs meet at the annual Carbon Disclosure Project jamboree, having flown in by plane, and stay in the best hotels to hear how much carbon they have consumed in the past year.

But the Carbon Disclosure project is not willing to disclose its own carbon footprint.

The co-ordinator of this Greenwash farrago is Londoner Paul Dickinson, a former secretary, who now flies extensively around the world on his important planet-saving mission of getting people to fly less often. Or is that plane-saving mission?

Dickinson’s “philosophy”

“I am not very fond of the word ‘green’ or ‘environmentally friendly’” says Dickinson, “as I think there is an impression in such terms which doesn’t help us navigate effectively through to where we need to be going.

“I eat meat which I really shouldn’t do because there is a terrible carbon footprint associated with it. I certainly don’t recycle anything because I am not convinced of the maths about that sort of thing.”

“However,” he goes on. “I also think you need to put a line in the sand somewhere, so I haven’t flown on holiday since 2001.

And that, apparently, is it - the only contribution to the alleviation of global warming claimed by the CEO of the Carbon Disclosure Project is that he does not fly on holidays. Is he green, or just mean?

“I do fly on climate change business quite extensively,” he says. But beyond that there is no clue as to the exact carbon footprint of the Carbon “disclosure” Project.

“We do not measure this information,” said a Carbon Disclosure Project spokesman. Funny that, because we asked them a year ago and they said then that they were considering doing so. Perhaps they are worried that their own consumption levels are so high it would be embarrassing.  Or perhaps disclosure is just for other people.

Additional Reading:
More companies disclose carbon emissions and set reduction targets.  What Next?
Corporate response to climate change