Super Eco

Photo credit: kit1578, stock.xchng

It's a real shame that rampant greenwashing by unscrupulous companies scrambling for a buck turns so many people off from things that could really improve their lives and our environment. It pays to be suspicious of eco-claims that sound too good to be true (and sometimes, of course, it pays not to shop at all). So when we ran across this nifty new effort to cut through the confusion surrounding carbon offsets, we knew we had to share it.

"Every product causes CO2 emissions during their production, transportation and storage; it doesn’t matter whether it is the cereal you eat for breakfast, the energy needed to send an email or the fuel for your car," explains The CO2Code Initiative. Products bearing their new CO2Code symbol have created emissions, too—only now, you can measure that carbon impact and find out what the manufacturer is doing about it. The CO2Code provides a handy little tracking number that helps you spot products from companies that care about their manufacturing carbon footprint. Look up the barcode on the internet to find out how much emissions the product caused and what climate project the product's offsets will benefit.

The CO2Code symbol isn't a certification and it doesn't imply that the product has met specific carbon emission standards. What it does do is to show that the product maker has paid a third party to offset the greenhouse gas emissions associated with its manufacture. And eFormic's added barcode lets you look up the product on the web to find out more about what carbon-reduction projects were used. Earth2Tech has more details; it's pretty neat. The new system represents anti-greenwashing at its finest: fighting eco-fictions with cold, hard facts. We like it.