KitKats are no longer carbon neutral. That’s good

Many of us lack the means to do much more than buy supposedly sustainable KitKats. Huge companies like Nestle do have those means, and their actions have a real impact. (Source: Bloomberg)

Carbon emissions aren’t like parking tickets. You can’t just pay a little money to clear your record and avoid the dreaded boot, thus freeing yourself to blithely park someplace else.

Yet too many companies use the market for carbon offsets this way. They buy credits that don’t come close to making up for their contributions to global warming, giving themselves a pass to emit more carbon. Fortunately, some are waking up to the reality that they must do more.

Consumer food behemoth Nestle SA is getting out of the offset market and putting the money it would have spent on those credits toward cutting emissions in its supply chain and operations. It’s also dropping “carbon neutral” pledges for KitKat, Perrier and other Nestle brands, Bloomberg News reported.

The ranks of former offsetters are growing as the practice faces risingcriticism that it too often amounts to greenwashing. Many offsetting projects don’t meaningfully contribute to reductions in carbon emissions in the world, instead giving companies credit for reductions that would have happened anyway. Or they rely on methods that don’t remove as much carbon from the atmosphere, or for nearly as long, as the carbon the companies pumped in the first place.

For example, planting trees is a common offsetting technique. But trees seem to be catching fire more often as the planet warms, releasing all the carbon they contain. Just this month, about 247 acres of the BigCoast Forest Climate Initiative offsetting project in British Columbia have burned in Canada’s record wildfire season. This was a tiny fraction of the overall project but a reminder of how fleeting tree-based offsets can be.  

But these companies still need to replace offsetting with real plans to fight emissions. It remains to be seen how much better Nestle’s approach will fare. It still includes such squishy measures as habitat protection, wetlands restoration and … planting trees. On the other hand, those aren’t the only tools Nestle means to deploy; it makes a relatively robust accounting of its carbon emissions and has a multifaceted, detailed plan for reaching net-zero emissions by 2050.

Aggressive approaches to cutting emissions aren’t as easy or cheap as simply buying forgiveness. But as activists and investors agitate and sue companies over what they call greenwashing, making those reductions becomes more attractive.

It may also turn out to be good for business, or at least tolerable to shareholders. EasyJet Plc announced last September that it was ditching offsets and investing instead in expensive new technology to go carbon neutral. Its stock has experienced some air pockets since then but has managed to gain 59 percent over that time.

The jury is still out on how eager consumers will be to buy more legitimately sustainable goods, especially if they are more expensive. Consumers claim
to care about sustainability, but their motivation when the shopping cart hits the aisles is murkier. A recent McKinsey study found consumer goods labeled ESG-friendly averaged 28% cumulative growth over a five-year period, compared with 20% for goods lacking such labels. But the consulting firm couldn’t establish any causality.

Doubtless, “green” products must appeal to that helpless, guilty part of us that feels (probably incorrectly) as if we are destroying the planet in every other aspect of our daily lives. Many of us lack the means to do much more than buy supposedly sustainable KitKats. Huge companies like Nestle do have those means, and their actions have a real impact.

Through changes to its supply chain, manufacturing and packaging, Nestle claims it was responsible for 93.3 million tons of carbon last year, roughly the output of Morocco. But that was down 6.4 million tons from what Nestle calls its “business as usual” path. It would take a million individuals driving electric cars, going vegan and flying less to effect a similar reduction.

That makes it all the more important that consumers and investors push for corporate decarbonisation efforts that are credible and meaningful. It might help if we choose to give our business to those who do make such efforts. Fortunately, the momentum is moving in the right direction.

Mark Gongloff is a Bloomberg Opinion editor and columnist covering climate change. Views are personal and do not represent the stand of this publication.

Credit: Bloomberg