About greenpig

greenpig was born of a desire for simplicity. A simple way for concerned people to save for the future of our planet. A simple way to make a personal difference. A simple way to do something positive.

Some people have spent years working out very complicated tools to calculate exactly how many greenhouse gases you're responsible for. We didn't and we don't use theirs. We picked out the things that make the biggest impact for most Australians - like cars, household energy and flights. 

Then we've given you packages to choose from based on the average australian.  Your car might be smaller, your house might larger and you could fly about the same as the average Australian. Together, these three packages will offset a big chunk of the greenhouse gas emissions you are personally responsible for.

If you want a completely clear conscience, we've also given you the option to go the whole hog and offset your share of Australia's mammoth emissions through our Offset Me package.

How we calculate emissions for our offset packages

To make things simpler we've given you a range of options based on averages. For example, for every litre of petrol used in a motor vehicle, 2.4 kilograms of carbon dioxide (CO₂), a major greenhouse gas, is released from the exhaust. A small car driving 15,000km a year will use 975 litres of petrol, thereby emitting 2.34 tonnes of carbon dioxide. You can find information specific to your model of vehicle at The Green Vehicle Guide.

Your household emissions are calculated using state averages for energy use and greenhouse factors for fuels. We take into account average standby emissions of your electronics equipment, whitegoods and the number of people in your household.

Why do we use averages? We use averages because it makes it simpler for you. We don't know how many kilowatts of power our homes used last year and we don't expect you to either.

What is emission offsetting?

Carbon emission offsetting is a way of compensating for greenhouse gas emissions produced with an equivalent emission saving.

Projects creating emission savings (offsets) range from tree planting to wind farms.

Trees extract CO₂ from the atmosphere as they grow. Wind farms produce energy without producing greenhouse gases. Every kilowatt of power produced by a wind farms means one less kilowatt needed from a source that does produce greenhouse gases (like coal).

There are also projects like methane collection and combustion, avoided deforestation and solar power generation - all of which either remove CO₂ from the atmosphere or prevent the release of C0₂.

By purchasing one tonne of carbon offset from greenpig, you are funding the removal of one tonne of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Our preferred supplier is AGL's Landfill Gas Flaring Project. AGL are one of the founding members of the Greenhouse Friendly^TM program.  Greenhouse Friendly^TM projects meet rigid additionality criteria and produce the highest quality carbon offsets (Page 10).