“My CO.2 emissions”
“My CO.2 emissions” and offset payments: I’d really like to know, in light of the Coca-Cola topics recently presented on ZDF about environmental and ocean pollution and their ORIGINAL culprits, whether sellers of the goods offered, the commission-rich eBay platform itself, as well as other main beneficiaries of these transports (e.g. postal/DHL etc. courier + parcel services, carriers, etc.) also contribute - at least financially - to the “one-sidedly initiated by the buyer” and calculated (in my opinion, by the way, incorrect) CO.2 burdens? ….and if so, by how much? … in individual cases and also publicly … that would surely be worthy of recognition and admiration! That can surely be worked out scientifically or by AI down to the gram and € exactly? Enforce it? In terms of environmental morality, buying via eBay, from an authoritative source, is now apparently being interpreted as ‘negative’ and a public admission of guilt and reparation is demanded or expected only from the buyer, although the origin is conveniently ‘blind’ or ignored or uninvolved or at least not taken into account ????? I think that this, “my” so-called partial environmental pollution guilt, expressed in “My CO.2 emissions = KG” and a reparation certificate in the form of “€’s + cents request”, the share of this harm, specifically that of the seller and eBay, as well as of other beneficiaries of this trade-caused emissions, should immediately be placed visibly and appropriately alongside it. Wouldn’t that just be fair? …. even if quite counter-productive? …. but as is well known: HONESTY lasts the longest! What do you think?
If everything is then fair and clearly visible, then we should also look at the basis for assessment and usage in free democratic discussion!
Heia Safari! heinzey1943 (the member lives permanently at the southernmost point of Africa)
katzenjogi
·2 years agoHello @heinzey1943
for data protection reasons alone, the calculation can’t be exact at all. Because for that, the algorithm would have to know exactly what item was produced when and where, how heavy it is, how it was packaged, what packaging material was used, and so on. The calculation would also have to take into account how it even got to the shipping provider? On foot, by bicycle, electric car, diesel vehicle? And how often was it repackaged into how many different vehicles, how many meters did it travel on conveyor belts, how long was it stored, was the warehouse lighting on, and so on and so on.
And in the end, you’d also have to calculate how full the delivery vehicle was when it brought the package to you, did it have to take detours, was it stuck in traffic....
So really, it’s impossible to calculate this exactly for millions of transactions a week. Above all, the time the server needs to carry out the calculations would also have to be added to the CO² footprint.
That means that you basically increase your CO² emissions just by looking up the figures for it in your eBay account.
For me personally, it’s basically just a marketing tool that eBay can use to generate a bit of extra revenue and that one or another buyer may buy a clear conscience with.
I personally also see myself as an environmentalist - I don’t drive a car, use public transport or a bicycle without electric drive, have a photovoltaic system on the roof, separate my trash, have been using a cloth shopping bag for all purchases for 40 years, have never flown, have never taken a cruise, spend my holidays at home, and have long since converted all the lighting in the house to LED. I buy fruit and vegetables exclusively from countries in the EU and meat only from the local butcher.
But I still buy used items on eBay, not to avoid CO² in production, but simply because it’s cheaper. And because some things can only still be bought used.
If I remember correctly, there were some threads here in the forum last year where the CO² discussion got a bit out of hand, but they seem to have been lost in the depths of the archive; since then I haven’t looked at my CO² account again either, simply because it has no meaningful value due to the calculation model used.
miriam@ebay
Hello @heinzey1943! Thanks for your critical post, in which you write that the burden of CO₂ emissions should not rest solely on the buyer and that all parties involved, including sellers and logistics partners, can help reduce and offset these emissions.
We see your reaction to this topic, and even though I can’t tell you what fair and effective approaches to environmental responsibility in e-commerce could look like in concrete terms, I can explain how your “CO₂ account” on eBay works and what you can do if you do not want to use it.
It shows you the CO₂ emissions of your eBay purchases from the last 12 months as approximate values. We calculate the emissions based on scientifically tested methods. To do this, we use values for an average product in each product category, which were pre-calculated by South Pole. The calculation of the CO₂ emissions of all eBay purchases is carried out solely by eBay. No personal data is shared with South Pole (neither data about users as individuals nor data about their eBay purchases). We calculate the CO₂ emissions only when and each time users access their “CO₂ account,” and we do not store the calculated values.
If you do not agree to the processing of the data from your eBay purchases for this purpose, you can object to the processing at any time and prevent it by no longer accessing your “CO₂ account” on eBay.
I hope this has helped you, and thank you for coming to the community to share your thoughts with us here 🙂.
Best regards
Miriam