Increasing adoption of voluntary carbon offsets among tourists

ABSTRACT

Air travellers have had the option to purchase voluntary carbon offsets (VCOs) available to them for almost a decade, yet adoption rates remain low. Drawing upon diffusion of innovations theory, and based on a sample of 449 German long-haul tourists, we analyse knowledge of VCOs, and using logit regressions, the probability of their purchasing VCOs. We investigate the profile of people who have actually purchased VCOs, unlike many earlier researchers who used stated preferences data to estimate willingness to pay. Our findings reveal that the drivers of adoption are primarily linked to lifestyle factors, including being young, adventurous, and having a vegetarian/low climate impact diet. A proportion of tourists are aware of VCOs but have not practiced offsetting to date, although they are positive towards the idea, are used to make donations, and are committed to environmental issues. Persuading travellers belonging to this group to actively engage in using VCOs is an important task for future VCO market development. It will be necessary to compare best-practice/less best practice airline policies, explore how to make VCO schemes more visible, and more closely examine the adopters market segment to improve communication strategies and encourage increased uptake of VCOs.

提升旅游者中间自由碳抵消的实施

航空旅客拥有自由碳抵消的购买权利已有将近十年，但该权利的采用率却一直很低。本文通过借鉴扩散理论（Rogers，2003）和 499个德国长途游客的例子分析了自由碳抵消的相关知识和逻辑回归法下购买碳信用额的可能性。结果显示，旅客购买行为的驱动力主要与他们的生活方式有关，如年轻，爱冒险，以及有低碳饮食习惯。虽然有一部分游客知道自由碳抵消，并对其持积极的态度，也曾参与捐款，及致力于解决环境问题，但到目前为止他们并没有将这个理念付诸于实践。劝说游客加入到自由碳抵消的群体中对该活动未来的发展起着尤为重要的作用，因此我们有必要使自由碳抵消计划被更多人熟知。今后的研究应该更加密切地调查用户的划分以此促进传播策略，并鼓励游客积极参与到自由碳抵消的实践中来。

KEYWORDS:

• Climate change
• voluntary carbon offsetting
• innovation process
• adoption
• diffusion
• tourist behaviour

关键词:

• 气候变化
• 游客行为
• 创新过程
• 采用
• 扩散
• 自由碳抵消

Acknowledgments

This research forms part of the project CERPA (Certification of Protected Areas). The authors would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their very helpful comments and valuable suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research.

Notes on contributors

Anna Segerstedt

Anna Segerstedt holds a PhD from the Leibniz University Hannover, Institute for Environmental Economics and World Trade. Her research interests include innovative measures to protect climate and ecosystems.

Ulrike Grote

Ulrike Grote is professor at the School of Economics and Management of the Leibniz University Hannover where she heads the Institute for Environmental Economics and World Trade. Her research focuses on environmental and development economics and international trade.