It’s important to understand why Old Maine Outfitters decided to go carbon neutral. Climate change is one of the greatest threat to fish and fisheries on the planet, and according to the Intergovernmental Panel in Climate Change (IPCC), the world would have to curb its carbon emissions by at least 49% of 2017 levels by the year 2030 and then achieve carbon neutrality by 2050 in order to avoid catastrophic climate change effects. As a fishing brand we love to fish and want to protect what we love by doing our part to be part of the solution.
Old Maine Outfitters founder Patrick Rudman had this to say, “We decided to join the Fly Fishing Climate Alliance, which is made up of fly fishing guides, shops, lodges, brands and nonprofits committed to going carbon neutral by 2030. It’s not enough to fight for surface level changes and not go after route causes. Since the beginning our efforts have been focused on raising awareness around the diminishing striped bass population along the east coast. While there are many factors at play, climate change is certainly one aspect and could soon outpace any regulatory measures to protect these fish. We feel it is our obligation to this fishery, and to the world to do everything in our power to protect it for future generations to come.”
Carbon Neutral is defined by the World Resources Institute as “annual zero net anthropogenic (human caused or influenced CO2 emissions by a certain date. By definition, carbon neutrality means every ton of anthropogenic CO2 emitted is compensated with an equivalent amount of CO2 removed (e.g. via carbon sequestration)….”
Methodology
Old Maine Outfitter’s Carbon Footprint is based in the GHG Protocol Corporate Accounting Standard and is created as a reference for what we are including in your Carbon Footprint, which provides you with relevant, complete, consistent, transparent and accurate GHG inventory.
Spend-based method – Estimate emissions for goods and services by collecting data on the economic value of goods and services purchased and multiplying it by relevant secondary (e.g., industry average) emission factors (e.g., average emissions per monetary value of goods).
Organizational Boundary: We are taking a financial control approach, which assumes that your business has financial control over its operations and the ability to direct the financial and operating policies over these activities.
Operational Boundary: In order to set our operational boundaries, we must report our Scope 1 (direct emissions) and Scope 2 (indirect emissions) and are voluntarily reporting our Scope 3 (indirect emissions). For more information on see table below:
Our Carbon Footprint
Below is a summary of our 2020 carbon footprint:
- SCOPE 1 GHG Emissions: 0.7 mtCO2e
- SCOPE 2 GHG Emissions: 0.2 mtCO2e
- SCOPE 3 GHG Emissions: 2.4 mtCO2e
- 1.1 Heating: We accounted for the GHG emissions associated with burning distillate fuel oil for my home office.
- 2.1 Electricity: We accounted for the GHG emissions associated with my home office.
- 3.1 Manufacturing/Product Embodied Carbon: We are a small business and have a correspondingly small carbon footprint, but we did account for the embodied carbon of our products.
- 3.2 Capital Goods: Not applicable.
- 3.3 Fuel & Energy Related Activities: Not material.
- 3.4 Inbound Shipments: We estimated the weight of all of our hat orders for 2020 based on the weight per hat x the number of hats + 2 pounds of packaging weight.
- 3.5 Waste Generated in Operations: We estimated the weight of our trash sent to the landfill and what was recycled to determine the weight of the waste generated in our operations.
- 3.6 Business Travel: 2020 was a weird travel year due to COVID, so we did not have any business travel in 2020.
- 3.7 Employee Commuting: We work from home, so not applicable.
- 3.9 Shipments to Customers: We also accounted for the number of packages we shipped to our customers through our online store.
That said, in following the GHG Protocol Corporate Standard, we did not include some of the recommended categories because they were deemed not applicable, such as: capital goods, upstream leased assets and end-of-life of sold products.
How We Achieved Carbon Neutrality
Before we explain how we went carbon neutral, we feel it’s also important to define carbon offsets:
Carbon Offsets: “An offset project is “a specific activity or set of activities intended to reduce GHG emissions, increase the storage of carbon, or enhance GHG removals from the atmosphere.” The project must be deemed additional; the resulting emissions reductions must be real, permanent, and verified; and credits (i.e, offsets) issued for verified emissions reductions must be enforceable.”
So, you are probably wondering, how did we go carbon neutral if our carbon footprint is 3.3 mtCO2e? In short, we purchased carbon offsets for our Scope 1, 2 & 3. We decided to purchase offsets from multiple projects around the world to increase our impact through choosing offsets that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, sequester carbon and protect wildlife through the nonprofit, Cool Effect. All of the carbon offset projects we selected reduce GHG emissions, are additional, are verified and permanent. Below is a brief description of the project:
Native Alaskans Saving Lands: “This 8,618 acre forest project located in the Southeast Alaska panhandle on the Prince of Wales Island will sequester 650,000 tonnes of emissions over the first 20 years of its 40-year life. Klawock Heenya consists of coastal rainforest of conifer, western hemlock-Sitka spruce and western redcedar-hemlock forests in Southeast Alaska.”
While we are thrilled to have taken this critical step to better understand Old Maine Outfitter’s carbon footprint, and now the real work begins. We understand that the most important thing we can do as a business is to reduce our footprint, and we have already begun executing some greenhouse gas reduction strategies. We know that carbon offsets are not the perfect solution, but feel strongly that we need lots of imperfect solutions if we are going to win the battle against climate change. We are just trying to do our part as beneficiaries of the resource.
Follow us on our sustainability journey as we strive to reduce our carbon footprint to protect what we love!
Old Maine Outfitters Carbon Footprint was calculated by Emerger Strategies with the Fly Fishing Climate Alliance Carbon Measurement Tool and the Report was produced by Emerger Strategies.