DEL.ICIO.USAtlanta claims nation’s first ‘carbon-neutral zone’
Virginia-Highland businesses band together to help environment
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Friday, January 23, 2009
Think of it as the intersection of good times and good intentions.
A new sign at the corner of Virginia and North Highland avenues proclaims the intown Atlanta shopping and dining district a “carbon-neutral zone.” What it doesn’t say is that Virginia-Highland also claims to be the nation’s first such zone.
JASON GETZ / jgetz@ajc.com /Staff
Antje Kingma, owner of Eco-Bella, stands in front of her business next to the green and purple carbon neutral site certified sticker on Highland Avenue in Atlanta.
JASON GETZ / jgetz@ajc.com
A large Carbon Neutral Site Certified sign is shown above Mitzi’s Shoe Box on the corner of Virginia and Highland Avenue.
BECOMING CARBON-NEUTRAL
Step 1: The landlord of 18 Virginia-Highland merchants hired Verus Carbon Neutral to audit their carbon footprint by examining utility use, commuting and other factors.
Step 2: Verus calculated their CO² emissions and determined a fee, based on market prices, to offset the effect on the atmosphere.
Step 3: Verus used the fees to buy offsets through the Chicago Climate Exchange. The CCX verifies projects that either replace or remove CO², such as solar power or forestry. Virginia-Highland's money went to support sustainably managed Georgia timberland owned by a foundation that contributes to animal welfare causes.
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While this could be seen as the latest chapter in the annals of green marketing — another emission in all the talk about global warming — there’s actually substance behind the boast.
The carbon-free zone is the result of a pilot project engineered by a local environmental company — an intricate transaction linking 18 merchants, a trading exchange in Chicago, a charitable foundation in Atlanta and thousands of acres of forest in rural Georgia.
“I’m sure most of us don’t understand exactly how it works,” says Andy Kurlansky of Everybody’s Pizza, one of the Virginia-Highland businesses that paid to be part of the venture. “But I still thought it was worthwhile.”
It all started with a year-old Atlanta company called Verus Carbon Neutral Partnership. For a fee, it audits a business’ carbon footprint: the net effect of its utility use, transportation and waste production on the environment. Verus then calculates an offset, a payment the business can make to compensate for its emissions, usually by funding alternative energy, sustainable forests or some other endeavor that reduces greenhouse gases by removing them from the atmosphere or not producing them in the first place.
Verus is the first to admit that it’s all rather complicated.
“We spend 90 percent of our time explaining how it works,” says company founder Eric Taub, a former hedge fund manager who got the germ of the idea from his father-in-law, Richard Sandor.
Sandor started the Chicago Climate Exchange, a market where carbon credits and offsets are traded like pork belly futures in the interest of fighting climate change through capitalism. Time magazine called him “the father of carbon trading.”
Last fall, Verus pitched its services to a sympathetic prospect, Antje Kingma, one of the owners of Eco-Bella, a Virginia-Highland shop that sells organic bedding, apparel and housewares.
Kingma comes from Germany, the breeding ground of the Green Party, and readily agreed to have her business audited. She was shocked when Taub told her that Eco-Bella was responsible for 22 metric tons of carbon dioxide a year.
“I felt dirty,” she says, only half-joking. “I felt evil.”
Twenty-two metric tons is actually far below the amount of CO² produced by the average three-bedroom household. But Kingma still wanted to pay environmental penance, so she gladly wrote a check of $87 for the first year’s offset.
She thought it would be nice if her neighbors did likewise, so she approached her landlord, Stuart Meddin, whose company owns the adjoining storefronts at the northwest corner of Virginia and North Highland. A veteran of green developments like Glenwood Park, he offered to underwrite the audits for all 18 businesses — a cost of more than $7,000 — if they paid for the offsets.
Kingma presented the idea to the other tenants during their regular meeting last September at Fontaine’s Oyster House. With the economy cratering and gas pushing $4 a gallon, it was a terrible time to be floating the idea of another expense — especially one that’s not tax-deductible.
“The carbon thing wasn’t the issue. People were more concerned about the cost,” says Brian Jolly of Half-Moon Outfitters, a store on North Highland.
The owner of DabberDoo, a gift boutique next to Eco-Bella, was skeptical. Christie Harper, an SUV-driving mom from Cobb County, believes global warming is real but suspects it has been exaggerated. Her brother is even more doubtful. When she told him Virginia-Highland was considering going carbon-neutral, he scoffed: “You are freakin’ kidding me.”
In the end, Harper decided to go along with her neighbors. “I figured it couldn’t hurt,” she says.
The price of the offsets ranged from $10 a year for Lulu Blue, a petite sweet shop, to $600 for Highland Tap, a steakhouse. Restaurants inevitably leave a larger carbon footprint with their sizable staffs and higher utility use.
“I’m the biggest polluter over here,” says the Tap’s general manager, Ron Haynes, who commutes 30 miles from Peachtree City and employs 35 people.
He’s still unsure whether his check bought anything more than a fuzzy feeling of virtue.
“It sort of made sense to me when they explained it,” he says. “But I do wonder what I’m doing to curb global warming. It feels like I’m just spending money to make up for the damage I’m doing to the environment. I guess it’s better than doing nothing.”
What did the merchants’ money buy?
Verus traded it on the Chicago Climate Exchange for offsets that support a “carbon sequestration” project in Georgia. Translation: sustainable forest land managed in a way that maximizes and measures removal of carbon from the atmosphere.
Valley Wood, a Columbus timber company, manages the project for the Holland M. Ware Charitable Foundation of Atlanta, which owns 64,000 acres of land in middle and south Georgia. The foundation, in turn, supports animal welfare causes.
Trees and puppies — no wonder Virginia-Highland feels good about itself.
Critics of carbon offsets regard them as something akin to papal indulgences, a modern version of buying absolution. Whatever one thinks of them, they represent cutting-edge environmental thinking of a sort not usually associated with the Deep South.
“When we call businesses in California, some of them snub us,” says Verus partner Andrew Keenan. “They figure people in a red state like Georgia couldn’t know much about the environment. We want to show them that we’re not a bunch of hicks.”
The carbon-neutral zone is already attracting attention close to home.
Just last week, Verus met with the Decatur Downtown Development Authority to discuss the possibilities for that enclave of alternative lifestyles and tree-hugging sensibilities.
“It sounds like something Decatur would get behind,” says the authority’s Linda Harris, who wonders how Virginia-Highland beat them to the punch.
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