corporate
Net zero explained — and the traps to avoid
Net zero is one of the most over-used phrases in climate. Here is what the SBTi actually requires, and the three traps that catch most corporate climate plans.
The fundamentals
Net zero is one of the most over-used phrases in climate. Here is what the SBTi actually requires, and the three traps that catch most corporate climate plans. The corporate category sits at the intersection of climate science, corporate accounting, and traveller behaviour — three audiences that rarely share a vocabulary, which is why so much of the public conversation about carbon ends up talking past itself.
To understand what's at stake, start with the unit. A carbon credit, an emission, a reduction, a removal, an offset — these all reduce to a single tonne of carbon-dioxide-equivalent (tCO₂e). Methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, and other greenhouse gases convert to that same unit using IPCC global-warming-potential factors. Once everything is denominated in tCO₂e, the comparisons become possible.
The corporate finance angle
Carbon accounting started as an environmental discipline. In 2026 it is increasingly a finance one. Treasury teams now hold carbon credits as assets on the balance sheet (typically at cost, sometimes at fair value depending on jurisdiction). Internal carbon prices — shadow prices that get applied to capital decisions — are running at €60-150 per tonne at most large European corporates.
That has knock-on effects for the travel category specifically. Procurement teams running corporate travel programmes now ask for emissions data per booking, attach an internal carbon price, and increasingly prefer suppliers whose offset programmes are auditable down to the registry serial. IMPT's per-booking retirement record is built for exactly this — it gives corporate procurement an audit trail without the supplier having to write a custom report.
The IMPT angle
When you book a hotel through IMPT, one verified tonne of CO₂ retires automatically against your booking. The credit comes from a Verra- or Gold Standard-listed project, default-weighted toward removal-track methodologies (biochar and mangrove restoration). The retirement is recorded on-chain with your booking ID, queryable for life. No add-on fee, no upsell at checkout, no opt-in box.
It is not a perfect climate solution — no single travel booking is. It is, however, one of the cleanest carbon accounting units in the consumer travel category, and it survives the same questions you would ask of a corporate climate disclosure: is it real, is it additional, is it permanent, is it verifiable? The answer to all four is yes, and the registry record is one click away from your confirmation email.
What to do next
Two practical actions. First — if you've booked a hotel through any platform in the last year, check whether the offset they advertised actually retired to a registry serial in your name. Most don't. Second — when you next book travel, choose a platform where the offset is included by default rather than upsold at checkout, where the credit is removal-weighted rather than avoidance-only, and where the retirement record is queryable by your booking ID. That short checklist filters out roughly 90% of the marketing claims in the category.
Book a hotel — one tonne of CO₂ retired automatically.
Every IMPT hotel booking retires one Verra- or Gold Standard-listed carbon credit on your behalf. No add-on fee, no upsell, no catalogue. Just verified, on-chain retirement.