The world’s leading startup event Slush embarks on a journey towards carbon neutrality with Nordic Offset. The Slush sustainability team reports:
“In 2019, Slush conducted its first third party carbon footprint calculation covering emissions from the event, the organization’s year-round activities, as well as attendees’ flights, hotels and meals for their stay in Helsinki. The carbon footprint was calculated using 2018 data, and the resulting CO2 per attendee figure was used to estimate emissions for 2019. The result was 8829 tonnes of CO2.
Armed with a better picture of what Slush’s carbon footprint is comprised of, the next step for Slush is to proactively find ways to reduce that footprint, for example by creating a carbon budget for team travel, creating a better inventory system for the materials used in the design of the event, and thinking of new ways of scaling Slush’s influence beyond events.
Slush is on a journey towards not just carbon neutrality, but a carbon positive future. In the meantime, part of the sustainability mission of Slush is to offset emissions on a yearly basis. In 2019 Slush compensated its and its attendees’ carbon footprint through Nordic Offset. Slush’s climate investment has gone towards a REDD project to tackle deforestation in Brazil. An important part of Slush’s compensation activities is also supporting projects that have social, in addition to environmental, benefits for the communities the offsetting takes place in. The selected project provides capacity-building for local communities and strives for increased biodiversity in the region.
Sustainability is an integral part of the way Slush works, and understanding the organization’s carbon footprint is one crucial piece of that puzzle. In the coming years, Slush will continue to conduct a third party carbon footprint calculation to track its progress in reducing its carbon footprint, as well as compensate for the emissions on a yearly basis.”