Should I Offset My Business Travel Emissions?

In today's world, where climate change is one of the biggest challenges facing humanity, businesses can't afford to ignore their environmental impact—especially when it comes to travel. With corporate travel often contributing significantly to a company’s carbon footprint, carbon offsetting has emerged as a vital solution for reducing emissions. In this guide, we’ll explore how carbon offsetting can help businesses meet sustainability goals, the types of projects that make a difference, and when it’s appropriate to offset emissions, particularly in the context of business travel.

What Is Carbon Offsetting?

Carbon offsetting involves compensating for carbon emissions by investing in projects that reduce or remove an equivalent amount of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. For business travel, this is particularly relevant when air travel, accommodation, and road transport contribute to a company’s carbon footprint. By supporting initiatives that either avoid carbon from being emitted or physically remove it from the atmosphere, businesses can mitigate the environmental impact of unavoidable travel.

What Types of Carbon Offset Projects Are There?

Carbon offset projects can be categorised in several ways including; the type of emission reduction (avoidance or removal), the approach (nature-based or technology-based), the location, and the permanence of the carbon reductions.

Avoidance projects aim to prevent emissions from occurring. For example, funding renewable energy projects, such as wind or solar farms, avoids the need for carbon-intensive energy production from fossil fuels. Removal projects involve extracting carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Examples include reforestation projects, where trees absorb CO₂, or technology-driven solutions like Direct Air Capture, where machines capture and store carbon dioxide.

Carbon offset projects are also split between nature and technology-based solutions:

• Nature-Based Solutions
  
  These include projects such as forest conservation, afforestation (planting new forests), or soil management techniques that increase carbon sequestration. Such projects often have additional biodiversity and community benefits, making them attractive for businesses looking for broader sustainability impacts.

  
  

• Technology-Based Solutions
  
  Carbon avoidance examples include investing in renewable energy projects like wind and solar, which replace fossil fuel-based energy sources. Carbon removal solutions, such as Direct Air Capture (DAC) and Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS), actively extract carbon from the atmosphere or industrial emissions and store it underground. While these technologies hold great potential, they are often more expensive and less widely deployed compared to nature-based solutions.

  
  

The type of carbon offset project depends largely on the location and environment. In the UK, projects often focus on reforestation or habitat restoration, using local ecosystems to absorb carbon, while coastal areas may adopt “blue carbon” initiatives like restoring mangroves and seagrass to capture CO2.

A sustainable travel hierarchy prioritises travel options based on minimising environmental impact helping you make more sustainable choices.

Permanence is also key—while tree planting requires long-term survival to sequester carbon effectively, technological solutions like carbon capture offer more permanent storage but are still evolving in terms of scale and cost.

What Governing Standards Exist for Offsetting?

To ensure credibility, offset projects should adhere to internationally recognised standards. Two of of the leading certification bodies are:

• Gold Standard

  Created by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), this standard focuses on high-quality carbon offset projects that also deliver social and environmental benefits beyond reducing emissions.

• Verra

  Through its Verified Carbon Standard (VCS), Verra certifies projects worldwide, ensuring transparency, accuracy, and real carbon reductions.

These standards ensure that offsets are additional (they wouldn’t have happened without the project), measurable, and permanent.

When Should You Use Carbon Offsetting?

Offsetting should be seen as part of a broader strategy for managing business travel emissions. According to the Oxford Principles for Net Zero Aligned Carbon Offsetting, offsetting is most appropriate when direct emissions reductions are not possible. Businesses should prioritise reducing their emissions first through strategies such as virtual meetings, optimised travel, or the use of lower-carbon transport modes. Offsetting should be a last step to neutralise the emissions that cannot be avoided.

What Steps Should I Take to Offset Business Travel Responsibly?

For businesses in the UK, travel is often an unavoidable necessity. However, it’s crucial to approach offsetting responsibly:

1. Refer to a Sustainable Travel Hierarchy

A sustainable travel hierarchy is a framework that prioritises travel options based on minimising environmental impact helping you make more sustainable choices. For example, it ensures that you first consider alternatives like virtual meetings or lower-carbon transport options before resorting to air travel. Bizumi provides a template sustainable travel hierarchy that prioritises travel ordered by environmental impact and productivity time.

2. When to Buy an Offset

Offsets are appropriate after measuring and reducing travel emissions as much as possible. The footprint of the trip carried out should be calculated and then offsets should be purchased matching the footprint. Many business travel platforms now integrate carbon calculators, for example, on Bizumi’s Cero3 platform you can calculate the footprint of your transport mode, such as train or aircraft. Once you have your carbon footprint of the trip source an offset retailer where you can purchase the equivalent total.

3. Reporting Offsets

Once an offset has been purchased and therefore retired by a third party, you should receive a retirement certificate or official records that explicitly name your organisation as the beneficiary of the retired offsets.

Transparency is key when reporting offset purchases. For greater transparency businesses should provide as many details as possible in their public reporting including; the type of project, the governing standard (e.g., Gold Standard), and the amount of CO₂ offset. Regular reporting not only enhances credibility but also allows stakeholders to see how the company is working towards its sustainability goals.

Conclusion

Carbon offsetting is a valuable tool for mitigating the unavoidable emissions associated with business travel. By selecting high-quality offset projects and following the Oxford Principles, businesses can demonstrate environmental responsibility while supporting global sustainability efforts. However, offsets are not a substitute for direct action, and businesses should focus on reducing travel emissions first, only turning to offsetting when reductions aren’t possible.