Carbon offsetting means paying to reduce, avoid, or remove greenhouse gas emissions elsewhere to compensate for emissions you can’t yet eliminate directly. One credit represents one metric tonne of CO₂-equivalent (CO₂e) reduced, avoided, or removed. When a credit is “retired,” it’s permanently taken out of circulation so it can never be resold or counted twice — that retirement step is what makes the compensation real.
How Is a Footprint Calculated?
Everyday activity — driving, flying, home energy, purchases — is converted into CO₂e using emission factors published by bodies like the UK’s DEFRA, the US EPA, and the IEA. Where methane (CH₄) or nitrous oxide (N₂O) are involved, each gas is converted to CO₂e using its Global Warming Potential (GWP) from the IPCC’s Sixth Assessment Report (AR6), which sets CH₄ at 27.9 and N₂O at 273.
Coffset’s carbon footprint calculator applies DEFRA 2024 factors and IPCC AR6 GWP values, and structures business footprints around the GHG Protocol’s three scopes: Scope 1 (direct emissions from owned sources), Scope 2 (purchased electricity and heat), and Scope 3 (everything else in the value chain, from business travel to purchased goods).
What Happens After You Buy a Credit?
Buying and retiring a credit are different events, and the gap between them is where many offsetting programs lose credibility — a credit can sit unretired in a registry for years, still tradeable, while a company has already claimed the reduction elsewhere.
On Coffset, credits are retired on a public registry — Verra or Gold Standard, depending on the project — within 24 hours of purchase, via CNaught’s managed portfolio. Retirement marks that specific tonne as consumed and issues a serial number, which is the real proof of the transaction, not the receipt.
What Makes an Offset Credible?
The Oxford Offsetting Principles (2024), from the University of Oxford’s Smith School, set the widely-referenced framework for quality:
- Additionality — would the reduction have happened anyway without offset revenue?
- Permanence — is the storage or avoidance durable, or reversible?
- No double counting — is the same tonne claimed by more than one party?
- Verification — independently certified by a standard such as Verra, Gold Standard, Climate Action Reserve, or Puro.earth?
- A shift toward removals over time — increasing the share of portfolios in carbon removal rather than avoidance alone.
Coffset’s portfolio, sourced through CNaught, aligns with these principles: exclusively Verra- and Gold Standard-certified projects, with the project mix disclosed rather than treated as a black box.
Avoidance vs. Removal Projects
Avoidance projects prevent emissions that would otherwise occur — REDD+ forest protection, landfill methane capture. Removal projects actively pull existing CO₂ from the atmosphere — reforestation, soil carbon sequestration, direct air capture. Removal is generally higher-quality but currently costlier and lower-supply, which is why most portfolios, including Coffset’s, remain avoidance-weighted while removal capacity scales.
A Worked Example
A user calculates 500 kg CO₂e using Coffset’s calculator pays for the equivalent credits, and Coffset routes the purchase through CNaught’s portfolio of Verra- and Gold Standard-certified projects. Within 24 hours the credits are retired on the relevant registry, generating a serial number, and the user receives a certificate referencing that specific retirement.
Quick Answers
What is a carbon credit? A tradeable unit representing one tonne of CO₂e reduced, avoided, or removed, tracked by a standard like Verra or Gold Standard.
What does retiring a credit mean? Permanently removing it from a registry so it can’t be resold or double-counted.
What is CO₂e? A common unit expressing any greenhouse gas’s warming impact in terms of equivalent CO₂, using IPCC GWP values.
Is offsetting a substitute for reducing emissions? No — the Oxford Principles treat it as a complement to direct reduction, not a replacement.
