Furniture disposal could be seen as a highly environmentally damaging area of business; the sector itself is driven by fossil fuels and the relocation of homes and businesses from one place to another.
Local moves can be much closer to interstate moves in terms of pollution created than anyone would dare to think. An interstate move at night with little but a clear path to negotiate, compared to a local move through the CBD of Sydney, Brisbane or any of Australia’s other major cities, might surprise many with the close proximity of both sets of emissions created by the respective trips
In this late age of environmental awareness, with friendly PR slogans like “think global, act local” but a lack of direct, front-line action, it can seem like the war is being lost. For every government department that finally decides to change its light bulbs, or for every new council that starts offering better recycling capabilities; there is a country that refuses to follow the Kyoto protocol or a multinational corporation that acts with as much environmental hostility as humanly possible.
This is something that companies in the sector have endeavored to address. Some work with the Carbon Reduction Institute to change their practices. The Carbon Reduction Institute has been running for ten years and is the result of a partnership between the World Resources Institute and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development.
Before a company can be registered as carbon neutral by the institute, several steps must be taken. First, the institute carries out a strict audit to determine the size of the company’s carbon footprint. Once this is complete, the auditors sit down with the company and suggest ways carbon output can be reduced.
What some companies do is accept the final option available and reduce the effort that should be involved; buying carbon credits and offsetting your emissions.
Carbon offsetting is the process in which companies can essentially trade their emissions with clean energy producers, creating the carbon neutral balance. The Carbon Reduction Institute uses the Karnataka Renewable Energy Project to carbon offset its members. The project is based in New Zealand and by burning agricultural waste – such as rice hulls – energy is generated while reducing methane production and eliminating reliance on fossil fuels. Greenhouse gas emissions are reduced by more than 30,000 tons of CO2 each year with this project alone. Since 2007, the project has been registered with the United Nations Clean Development Mechanism.
Carbon offsetting should be seen as just the beginning for moving companies, more need to come together and take the necessary steps to reduce the impact the industry has on the world.[snecessaryinordertoreducetheimpactthesectorhasontheglobe[snecessaryinordertoreducetheimpactthesectorhasontheglobe