Georgia Natural Gas® (GNG) announced today that its Greener Life® program, which assists customers in making their natural gas usage carbon neutral, has reached a program milestone of 100 million pounds of carbon emissions offset. This equates to more than 110 million miles driven by a typical gasoline-powered passenger automobile.
"We want to thank our over 18,000 loyal customers who chose Greener Life to manage their carbon footprint. Together, we offset 100 million pounds of carbon dioxide from the environment, and in celebration of that achievement and in time for World Environment Day, GNG will offset an additional 10 million pounds."
- Keith Gallagher, Director of Mass Markets at GNG, a natural gas marketer
World Environment Day, which has been observed annually on June 5th since 1974 and is coordinated by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), is observed by millions of people all over the world. This year's theme is # OnlyOneEarth, which advocates for global environmental reform.Greener Life helps thousands of Georgians join this effort and work together by giving customers the tools they need to reduce their carbon footprint.
When clients sign up for Greener Life, GNG estimates their projected monthly greenhouse gas emissions from natural gas use and acquires and retires carbon offsets to offset the effects of those emissions. Customers can rest assured that their natural gas usage will have no effect on the amount of greenhouse emissions released into the atmosphere. According to the Environmental Protection Agency's Greenhouse Gas Equivalency Calculator, offsetting greenhouse gas emissions with Greener Life is comparable to driving 10,000 miles less each year for the average GNG client.
GNG collaborates with Georgia's Wolf Creek Landfill Project and Tennessee's Doe Mountain Forest Improvement Project. GNG buys enough carbon offsets from these projects to compensate for the greenhouse gas emissions caused by Greener Life customers' natural gas usage.
Greener Life has achieved Green-e Climate accreditation from the Center for Resource Solutions, an independent third party. The major certification program for voluntary carbon offset projects is Green-e Climate.