Telstra hangs up on offsets
Australia's biggest telco has moved ahead of the pack in lifting its emissions ambitions, just as the climate wars are heating up again.
In a week where the climate wars were reignited by Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s pledge to walk away from legislated emissions reductions targets, one of our biggest companies is moving in the other direction.
Telstra announced today it would scale up its ambition to reduce its Scope 1 and 2 emissions — that is, direct emissions from its own operations and from the power it uses — by 70% instead of its previous 50%. It will also maintain plans to cut Scope 3 emissions — those of its customers and suppliers — by 50% by 2030.
It’s a good news story for Telstra, which only weeks ago announced it would lay off thousands of employees as part of a $350 million cost cutting drive. But from a purely environmental perspective, the move should be welcomed. The jewel in the crown of the announcement was Telstra’s pledge to move away from using carbon offsets to hit its emissions reductions targets.
This is what green activists and ESG-minded investors have for years been pushing for — that companies should look to reduce the ways they emit carbon within their own operations, and only turn to offsets as a last resort. Carbon offset markets have also been plagued by credibility issues.
