Climate language
The articles below talk about the difference between carbon neutrality, net zero, carbon positive, and other climate language that can be confusing and difficult to understand. “Climate language” can be problematic because it creates a barrier between climate activists, scientists, and the general public.
Read below for more info:
“If you’re confused what the “circular economy” is, or what it means for a company to go “net-zero,” you’re far from alone. There’s a big mismatch between what scientists, journalists, and activists are saying and what the public understands. This is hardly a new problem, but it’s yet another obstacle to getting people to care about climate change: Obscure words in articles about rising sea levels and supercharged weather could discourage people from wanting to learn more about a planetary crisis.”
Grist, Want people to care about climate change? Skip the jargon.
“Confusing terms are usually the product of marketing. When we all know what terms to use, we all can compare the efforts of nations, organizations and individuals. If we all come up with our own definitions and terms, none of us will be able to know what others are doing.
You’re carbon neutral if the amount of CO₂ emissions you put into the atmosphere is the same as the amount of CO₂ emissions you remove from the atmosphere. Your impact is neutral, zero. Putting it bluntly, you’re maybe not making it actively worse, but you’re not making it better either.
Carbon negative takes that idea a step further. You’re carbon negative if the amount of CO₂ emissions you remove from the atmosphere is bigger than the amount of CO₂ emissions you put into the atmosphere. Your impact is positive, meaning you’re actively doing something to better the climate.
At Compensate, we believe carbon negativity is the only way forward. The “safe levels” of CO₂ (350 ppm) were surpassed back in 1987, so we have both the historical responsibility and it is critically urgent to actively clean up the atmosphere. Learn more about this.
Net zero is broadly the same as carbon neutral: Emissions are still being generated, but they’re offset by the same amount elsewhere. The “net total” of your emissions is then zero…
This one should be easy, but it’s actually not. You’re creating zero emissions when there’s no CO₂ released at all. In our current system, however, no technology is truly zero emissions. Even the greenest of tech has so called embedded emissions. These are emissions that are created in the manufacturing of technology. So there might be zero ongoing emissions from use.”
Compensate, Understanding carbon neutral, carbon negative, net zero, climate positive
“As established previously, carbon-neutral and net-zero are two similar terms. In both cases, companies are working to reduce and balance their carbon footprint. When carbon-neutral refers to balancing out the total amount of carbon emissions, net-zero carbon means no carbon was emitted from the get-go, so no carbon needs to be captured or offset. For example, a company's building running entirely on solar, and using zero fossil fuels can label its energy as “zero carbon.”
However, when referring to "net-zero", it is crucial to specify net-zero carbon or emissions. On the contrary, net-zero emissions refer to the overall balance of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) produced and GHG emissions taken out of the atmosphere. Even if the scientific concept is often applied to countries like the US, China, it can also be used for organisations. In other words, net-zero describes the point in time where humans stop adding to the burden of climate-heating gases in the atmosphere.”
Plan A, What is the difference between carbon-neutral, net-zero and climate positive?
More reading
Cambridge English, Climate change: which words should we teach our learners?