IntroductionCarbon offsets, a method unused for SCU travel, offers potential in helping Santa Clara reach its goal to become carbon neutral by 2015. We investigated the feasibility of using carbon offsets to eliminate the emissions caused by student athlete and English department travel. More specifically, we constructed 3 proposals with varying aspects such as price, type of offsets, profit vs. non-profit. We tailored a program to fit SCU’s needs. We researched proposals in which sports and faculty travel are offset based on the sum of miles traveled. We believe that this administrative approach will allow for more fluid, future investment in carbon offsets.

Research Question: Can carbon offsets provide an effective solution to offsetting SCU travel?This project aims to research the amount of carbon given off by airplanes, buses, and vans used by student athletes and faculty members as they travel nationally and internationally. We based our study off of these two cohorts so that they act as example for future offset opportunities. After conducting research we find that the offset companies we provide will effectively work for our goal of carbon neutrality. In order to accurately utilize these carbon calculators, for our purpose in this project, we must first determine the exact amount of carbon given off. In order to do this we must calculate the distances traveled by both student athletes (club and NCAA) and the English Department. Then we must determine the number of people traveling and the means by which they travel.

Creating Carbon Offsets for Faculty and Athletic Travel to Help Santa Clara Achieve Carbon Neutrality by 2015

ENVS 95 Carlton Gossett, Athan Hsiao, Blake Leamy, Sean Mohr, Lawrence Tse

oAtmosfair provides the best services that reap the most social and environmental benefits. Their comprehensive calculator is especially useful for international travel compared to domestic travel. However, their high price discourages application towards NCAA travel. Faculty travel typically generates less carbon emissions although flying international makes the idea of using Atmosfair to offset faculty very appealing.oCarbonfund offers a modest and straightforward

method for offsetting travel emissions. Its lower prices compensate for its generic methods of carbon offsetting.oTerrapass is by far the cheapest company out of the

proposed three. Even though their calculator is not as accurate as the others, they offer a flat cost per ton of CO2, allowing the use of external calculators. Because of this feature, Terrapass will be by far the easiest company to use in terms of administration. Additionally, if Santa Clara was to try and offset all aspects of carbon emissions on campus, the CEO said there was potential for a long term contract.oCarbonica has been recurrent through all three

proposals not only because of their unique ground travel calculators, but also because of its extra feature of carbon credit trading. If the school was to adopt this idea, it would make the goal of becoming carbon neutral much more manageable by combining direct offsets with business interaction.

MethodologyoDetermine which cohort (sports teams, English

department) to present to the University to offsetoFind out how many miles each cohort traveled per

season/yearoResearch carbon offset companiesoChoose 4 offset companies to presentoApply the miles we found per cohort to the offset

companies carbon calculatorsoDo a cost analysis of each cohortoPresent our findings to the University  

Why Carbonica?oUnited Kingdom non-profit based with focus on

individuals and businesses.oEmphasis on reforestation and energy efficiencyoPassively encourages businesses to become

environmentally friendlyoSetback: Carbon calculator is not as good as other

companies’

Why TerraPass?oSan Francisco based (emphasizes a local business)oDecentralized setup: separate branches for different

offetsoMethane and energy emphasis oGreen energy productionoOpen to public criticism and opinionoTakes a business approach to offsets

Conclusion and RecommendationWe propose three different options:1. Atmosfair with Carbonica2. Carbonfund with Carbonica3. Terrapass with Carbonica

All three companies will be used to offset air travel while Carbonica will be used to offset ground travel.

Why Atmosfair?oGerman non-profitoOffers a variety of offsets (solar in India, wind in

Nicaragua)oEnergy efficiency over green energyoComprehensive calculatoroSetback: no road travel offsets

Why Carbonfund?oNon-profit in Silver Spring MarylandoOffets via renewable energy, methane,

reforestation, and energy efficiencyoCalculations solely derived from distance traveled

(allows some ease in calculation)

*This is just a small excerpt of the data we have compiled.

We chose to use Athletes because they travel the most among students on campus. We chose the English Department because they have one of the largest faculties accounting for 10% of the 461 person faculty. They represent a good base to judge the emissions of the rest of the University.

A special thanks to our Research Director SherryBooth. We could not have done this without her.