There’s a new initiative in Kansas City helping local households and businesses offset their carbon footprint. The best part? The offsets support local and regional projects that plant trees, restore grasslands, and regenerate the land.
Carbon Positive KC (CPKC) began this year as a local non-profit organization offering free carbon footprint inventories and providing monthly subscriptions of third-party verified offsets. Brian Weinberg and Bob Berkebile started CPKC after seeing the success of Carbon Neutral Indiana.
“We feel the eco-anxiety about climate change as much as anyone and wanted to create a tangible action for citizens to take personal responsibility for their households and businesses,” Weinberg said.
It already has 50 active members and is seeking new residents and businesses to sign up.
Measuring your Carbon Footprint
Like other carbon offset programs, it starts by measuring your carbon footprint. With Carbon Positive KC, you can schedule a free carbon inventory that looks at things like consumption, diet, and travel.
Participants receive a personalized visualization of their footprint, how it compares to others, and actions to do something about it.
The average carbon footprint for a person in the United States is 16 tons, one of the highest rates in the world, according to CPKC.
“It’s a shocking visual to think it would take planting 210 trees a month to balance my carbon footprint, said Parker H., a local homeowner who is signed up with the program. “In the future, I’m excited about some changes my family will make that will lower our carbon footprint and I’m happy to be carbon positive in the meantime.”
What does carbon positive mean? CPKC describes it as going a step further than carbon neutral. Carbon positive is when a person or organization removes more carbon from the environment than they emit.
The Offsetting Projects it Supports
The organization created a membership structure to help households and businesses offset their carbon with tax-deductible monthly donations that support an array of projects.
“We bundle an assortment of projects into a monthly subscription that allows you to affordably offset your entire carbon footprint while supporting projects that regenerate Kansas and Missouri,” Weinberg said.
The transparent and third-party-verified process involves purchasing and retiring credits, with regional examples including grassland restoration in Colorado and tree planting in Des Moines.
Locally, efforts include regenerating land near the Blue River with rotational grazing and agroforestry.
It is also actively seeking to add new projects near Kansas City.
“Most offsetting programs aren’t focused on building local communities focused on climate action education. Our dream is to have as many local project developers supplying this work,” Weinber said.
“Carbon Positive KC is a group of citizens taking personal responsibility for their households and businesses to address the climate impact of our modern lifestyles.”
Learn more about Climate Positive KC
- Households can book a free 15-minute carbon inventory at carbonpositivekc.org.
- CPKC is a project the Foundation for Regeneration, dedicated to creating meaningful demonstrations that showcase the promise of regeneration in the Midwest.
- To learn more about the projects it supports, visit carbonpositivekc.org.
Featured photo: Homeowner Parker H. is a member of Carbon Positive KC.