The first calculation of our ecological footprint for 2009 scared us off: About 5 tons of CO2 for an employee's flight to San Diego, California, for training.
We were not aware of the fact that it is so much until then.
However, the CO2 emissions for an inner German flight from Bremen to Munich and back are also immense: 0.58t.
For a company that offers its software and services in Europe, it is not easy to do without flights. Of course, customers do not pay for our travel time if, for example, they order a technician for installation.
We have set goals
1. As far as possible, no inner German flights to customers and suppliers.
2. Training for employees only in Germany including travel by train or participation in video conferences.
How did we support the transition?
In order to make it easier for employees to travel by train and other public transport, we introduced Bahncard 100 in 2015. This makes it possible to board a bus or train at any time and off you go: No rebookings for delays and no ticket purchase at the different vending machines of public transport.
The trips of the employees are now coordinated as much as possible in such a way that, for example, on the way to Munich or Stuttgart (there are direct flights from Bremen for both destinations) stopovers are planned for other customers. For a train journey from Bremen to a customer to Munich, there would otherwise be more than 12 hours of travel time.
What have we achieved to date?
Since 2011, no employee has travelled by air to a training.
We had 15 inner German flights (one way) in 2018. Our total CO2 emissions for air travel were only 3.25 tons in 2018.