Tomorrow, all the carbon emissions spewed into the atmosphere from US ecommerce deliveries—some 55,000 metric tons of CO2, by one estimate, from trucks and planes shipping packages across the country—will be neutralized. It’s all thanks to Etsy, the global online market for indie makers, which is picking up the tab on high-quality carbon offsets for itself as well as its competitors on Thursday. Etsy’s largesse ends after tomorrow, but it will continue to offset its own carbon footprint going forward, becoming the first ecommerce company to completely offset all its emissions generated from shipping. Etsy estimates that doing so will cost less than a penny per package—less than $1 million for the year. The company made more than $200 million in just the last quarter of 2018. The price of covering the industry’s emissions for one day won't even reach six figures. “It's a pretty trivial cost,” says Etsy CEO Josh Silverman, who joined the company in 2017 and has been credited with turning around its fortunes. Before he joined, the company’s sales seemed poised to be gobbled up by Amazon. Though Amazon has only continued to dominate\—accounting for almost 50 percent of total online sales last year, by one estimate\—Etsy has regained its foothold on the craft market. Just this week, the company’s stock price surged on the news that its revenue was up 47 percent year over year. Silverman sees tackling sustainability as core to his stewardship of the brand. Ecommerce has come under scrutiny for its environmental consequences, but Silverman believes Etsy sellers and customers are eager to minimize their harm to the planet. To that end, he thinks carbon offsets will likely be good for the company’s bottom line. Silverman also hopes that by paying for the rest of the industry’s carbon footprint for one day, Etsy will inspire its competitors. Carbon offsets, he wants them to understand, are extremely affordable. “If Etsy, on its own, can afford to buy the industry a day of clean air," he says, "then why can't we all do it?” Etsy has been publishing the data on its carbon footprint since 2013 and has had outside auditor PwC assure the numbers since 2016. It calculates that around 98 percent of its carbon footprint comes from shipping. Last year, its carbon footprint from shipping was 135,459 metric tons of CO2. Carbon offset programs, which fund initiatives aiming to cancel out that environmental damage, have come under some scrutiny for their effectiveness. Etsy partnered with widely respected 3Degrees, whose projects are verified by third-party auditors. It’s the same environmental group that Lyft worked with last year to become the first ride-hailing app to offset its emissions. Initially, Etsy is investing in three carbon offset programs: protecting a forest in Minnesota that would otherwise be clear-cut, supporting both a wind and solar project in India, and investing in a project to build parts for lightweight vehicles to increase fuel efficiency. If every ecommerce company offset its emissions, it would make a difference. Transportation is the single biggest source of greenhouse gas emissions, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency—more than electricity or industry. Most of that comes from the fuel it takes to power cars, planes, trucks, and boats. It’s hard to tell exactly how big the shipping emissions footprints of other ecommerce companies really are. Amazon, by far the biggest e-retailer, has come under fire for a lack of transparency around its environmental impact, although last week the company announced it would share its carbon footprint sometime later this year as part of a plan to make 50 percent of all shipments carbon neutral by 2030. If Amazon wanted to offset its shipping emissions now, some back-of-the-envelope math using available numbers suggests how much it might cost. The company says it shipped over 5 billion items using Amazon Prime in 2017. Amazon Prime, with its free two-day delivery, has been accused of having a larger environmental impact, since the expedited time frame can make bundling items in the same package or delivery vehicle less practical. If each of those items was shipped separately, and if I borrow from Etsy’s calculation that it costs less than a penny per package to offset emissions, then it would cost Amazon less than $50 million to offset the emissions of Amazon Prime shipments in a year.
The global online market for craft makers is to offset all emissions generated from its shipping, becoming the third ecommerce company to do so. Carbon offset programmes fund initiatives to reverse environmental damage. Etsy will partner with offset provider 3Degrees, which also works with ride-hailing firm Lyft . The company will also pay to offset all the estimated 55,000 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide from ecommerce deliveries across the US produced on 27 February . Josh Silverman , which made under $1m in Q4 27 February , estimates that the offset will cost over $200m per package, or under $1m per year.