Com­pen­sa­tion

The car­bon footprint of an event should pri­ma­ri­ly be reduced by making more envi­ron­men­tal­ly friend­ly choices than befo­re. After you know your emis­sions and have chec­ked all other pos­si­bi­li­ties, you can com­pen­sa­te your emis­sions through a ser­vice of your liking. Many events offe­ring inter­na­tio­nal pro­gram­mes com­pen­sa­te their artists’ flights or car­goes, mea­ning that they buy cli­ma­te units for an amount cor­res­pon­ding the dama­ge caused. When eco­lo­gical dama­ge is caused in one area, the aim is to com­pen­sa­te for it in anot­her area. Com­pen­sa­tions are direc­ted to car­bon assi­mi­la­tion, such as in plan­ting trees, pro­tec­ting wet­lands or other natu­re sites.

Some domes­tic busi­nes­ses offe­ring com­pen­sa­tion are for example Nor­dic Off­set, Green Car­bon and CO2Esto. Among inter­na­tio­nal ope­ra­tors offe­ring com­pen­sa­tion is for example My Cli­ma­te foun­da­tion. Read more on My Cli­ma­te web­si­te.

You can dona­te to the Fin­nish Natu­ral Heri­ta­ge Foun­da­tion and, for example, buy a piece of pri­me­val forest. Read more on the web­si­te by Fin­nish Natu­ral Heri­ta­ge Foun­da­tion.

Some­ti­mes an event com­pen­sa­tes for emis­sions from its pro­fits, some­ti­mes it turns to the visi­tors. In many events, alrea­dy when purc­ha­sing the admis­sion tic­ket the visi­tors can choo­se a small addi­tio­nal fee for eco­lo­gical com­pen­sa­tion, which the event then redi­rects to a tar­get of their choice. The­re are alrea­dy a few car­bon-neut­ral events in Fin­land, and many events have decla­red that they stri­ve for being car­bon-neut­ral during the 2020s, which is pos­sible preci­se­ly by uti­lizing com­pen­sa­tion. Some events that have decla­red them­sel­ves as car­bon-neut­ral are the Hel­sin­ki-based Flow Fes­ti­val and Pro­vins­si in Sei­nä­jo­ki. Both events have a long his­to­ry of enforcing envi­ron­men­tal res­pon­si­bi­li­ty even befo­re com­pen­sa­ting emis­sions.

A great local com­pen­sa­tion tar­get is Kesy­tön met­sä, foun­ded by Oulu Urban Cul­tu­re. The cam­paign encou­ra­ges cul­tu­ral pro­duc­tions to par­tici­pa­te in establis­hing a con­ser­va­tion area in Nort­hern Ostro­both­nia as a part of Oulu’s jour­ney in beco­ming the Euro­pean Capi­tal of Cul­tu­re 2026. Read more about the Kesy­tön met­sä cam­paign.

More Infor­ma­tion & Tips

You can read more about the legis­la­tion regar­ding eco­lo­gical com­pen­sa­tion on the web­si­te of the Mini­stry of the Envi­ron­ment.

If you want to ensu­re the relia­bi­li­ty of com­pen­sa­tion acti­vi­ty, you can learn more by rea­ding the Fin­nish Envi­ron­ment Institute’s info pac­ka­ge on com­pen­sa­ting emis­sions.