Carbon Footprinting and Pricing Under Climate Concerns

This article studies how organizations should design a product by choosing the carbon footprint and price in a market with climate concerns. The authors first show how the cost and demand effects of reducing the product carbon footprint determine the profit-maximizing design. Paradoxically, they find that stronger climate concerns may increase the overall corporate carbon footprint, even if the product itself is greener. Next, the authors establish that offsetting carbon emissions can create a win-win outcome for the firm and the climate if the cost of compensation is sufficiently low. Third, the authors show how regulation in the form of a cap-and-trade scheme or a carbon tax affects product design, firm profitability, and green technology adoption. Finally, the authors extend the analysis to a competitive scenario. Overall, these results can help marketing professionals by offering insight into how to address climate concerns through improved product design.

Carbon Footprint Analysis of an Educational Institution

Global warming and climate change are the foremost environmental challenges facing the world today. It is our responsibility to minimize the consumption of energy and hence reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases. Companies choose ‘Carbon Footprint’ as a tool to calculate the greenhouse gas emission to show the impact of their activities on the environment. In this working paper, we assess the carbon foot print of an educational institution and suggest suitable measures for reducing it. Greenhouse gas emitting protocol for an academic institution in terms of tones of equivalent CO2 per year is projected using three basic steps includes planning (assessment of data’s), calculation and estimation of CO2 emitted. The estimation of carbon foot print is calculated by accounting direct emission from sources owned/controlled by the educational institution and from indirect emission i.e. purchased electricity, electricity produced by diesel Generator (DG), transport, cooking (Liquefied Petroleum Gas) and other outsourced distribution. The CO2 absorbed by trees are also accounted. Some of the options are identified in order to reduce CO2 level. The information of corporate carbon footprint helps us identifying the Green House Gases (GHG) emission “hot spots” and identifies where the greatest capacity exists in order to reduce the GHG emissions. The main prioritization goes to transport and then followed by DG, cooking and then electricity. The per capita CO2 emission and the total CO2 emission for a typical educational institution are estimated.