Law firm goes green

A Christchurch law firm is taking steps to become carbon neutral after buying carbon credits from Energy Mad.

Goodman, Steven, Tavendale and Reid has purchased 209 credits at $20 each, a total of $4180.

It was calculated the firm emitted 209 tonnes of carbon a year from its activities including electricity, cars and flights.

Energy Mad, a Christchurch energy efficiency company, has 80,000 carbon credits to sell after it sold more than 800,000 Ecobulbs at Shell service stations throughout New Zealand.

The Ecobulbs use 80 per cent less electricity than an ordinary bulb.

Michael Singleton, of Goodman, Steven, Tavendale and Reid's associate commercial team, said the firm was moving to a new building next year and with the help of Energy Mad had estimated its carbon footprint. The firm would continue to monitor it next year before claiming it was carbon neutral.

It had reduced its emissions as much as it could before buying the credits to offset the remaining carbon it emitted.

"Voluntary carbon offsetting seems to be on everyone's lips at the moment.

"We've been doing some climate change work recently for a number of clients and there is an expectation that if you're going to do that sort of work you need to walk the talk."

Singleton said the firm had purchased the credits from Energy Mad because it was able to verify and authenticate its credits.

Energy Mad co-founder and director Tom Mackenzie said he hoped this was the first of many carbon credit sales for Energy Mad.

It was considering selling some on Trade Me, like Meridian Energy had done. Meridian Energy sold 1040 carbon credits for an average of $24.1 per tonne. The top price was $150 per tonne.

Mackenzie said Energy Mad would use the money to help the company pay for the Ecobulb scheme. It took a commercial risk by going ahead with the scheme knowing it was making a loss, but it was confident it could sell credits to fund it.

Each home that installs five Ecobulbs is expected to save up to $650 on power bills over the nine-year life of the bulb.

- © Fairfax NZ News