After an uneventful flight (upgrading to first class wasn’t worth it in my opinion, despite the long trip), I’ve arrived in San Francisco and made my way to the hotel, a very quick trip from the airport. This hotel is beautiful, and nothing like I anticipated for an “airport hotel.”
You can already feel the energy here for the event. People are walking around ready to get into the training. So far, most that I’ve seen have been Americans. Since people are arriving from all over the world, the event doesn’t start in earnest until later this afternoon to accommodate all sorts of different arrival times. Registration is still setting up but starts in less than thirty minutes, though, and then hopefully I can get my room so I can change out of travel clothes and into the “business-casual” look that’s suggested for the sessions.
I’ve noted from some online posts that some people who are arriving from Vancouver are a bit delayed, but hopefully they’ll get here in good time. Our Canadian contingent is only 115 individuals, so we don’t want to miss any of them.
You guys are sure wasting an awful lot of fossil fuel flying wingnuts to San Francisco. What’s the carbon footprint of this propaganda exercise?
Actually, the event had a very low carbon footprint. Here are some of the ways we prevented emissions for the meeting:
- carbon offsets were purchased for the flights for all attendees and staff
- an airport hotel was used to minimize ground travel
- meeting binders were made from 100% recycled fibres
- conference bags were made from 100% natural organic cotton
- menus included only locally grown organic foods
- three bins allowing for compost, recycling and landfill waste were at all meeting rooms
- the specific hotel chosen is already environmentally conscious; for example, two choices of flush for toilets to minimize water waste
There’s more, but I think you get the idea. For a meeting of this size, I think the emissions were as reduced and offset as possible, much more so than any other meeting that I’ve attended. And although some meetings can be done “virtually,” i.e. online, this type of training had to be done in person.
Contrast this with another type of meeting such as, say, the Super Bowl. Many thousands of people travel to one city, much energy used to put on the event, advertising, and broadcasting. And although entertaining, the Super Bowl does little by way of efforts to try to save the planet.
I don’t expect you’re convinced because in less than 25 words you’ve shown your true colours, but I think it’s important for people to know how emissions can be reduced if they want to make the effort.