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Carbon offsetting is a popular method of making an event carbon neutral . Event organisers therefore turn to virtual as a way of keeping track of the emissions they are producing .
Ed Tranter , managing director , 73 Media , said : “ There is no such thing as an easy carbon neutral event . Everything uses carbon . Everything creates waste , which in turn creates an impact , it just does . Because as soon as you step out your door , as soon as you switch on your computer , you are using energy , you are using resources .
“ The thing that makes it easier with virtual events is that it ’ s much easier to measure your impact . Therefore , it is easier to offset it or be able to plan so that you can make your event carbon neutral .”
Knowing your own internal figures , around server usage , emissions at a production site and how much energy an organiser uses , is one thing . But the chain of emissions
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from attendees is nigh on unquantifiable from the platform perspective .
Lionel Scurville , virtual event expert , said : “ The carbon footprint of an event will be much larger than it was before . There are all sorts of questions around the use of servers , and the drain on energy sources means it is leaving its mark , not just only where your event is taking place , but also now along that value chain .
“ That carbon footprint now is going to be spread across many places globally . What we don ’ t know is that carbon usage when doing it virtually ; that still is an unknown number at the moment .”
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“ There is no such thing as an easy carbon neutral event . Everything uses carbon . Everything creates waste , which in turn creates an impact , it just does .”
– Ed Tranter
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Measuring pains One part of keeping a sustainable charter on track is being able to track how events are impacting the local areas and the environment . On this latter point , though certain aspects can be tracked , the individual footprint of attendees is something our experts thought was an impossibility .
A roadblock to this is the fact platforms and organisers have to rely upon the users themselves to submit data on what set-up they are using to join a virtual event or meeting .
Lovatt , expanded on this point . She said : “ I think it ’ s something we ’ ve learned in the past two
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