Office in your own four walls: If employees forego driving to work more often even after the Corona crisis, the climate benefits and the traffic load drops significantly, a Greenpeace study shows. According to the calculations, CO2 emissions in German traffic could drop by 5.4 million tons per year if 40 percent of employees were to work two days from home a week. Against this background, Greenpeace is now initiating a political discussion about state funding for work from home.
Video conferencing, telephone and text messaging – the modern communication options keep employees up to date even at home and even a casual chat among colleagues is possible. Many therefore appreciate working in the home office, because they focus on saving time and being flexible within their own four walls. Before the Corona crisis, this way of working was comparatively little widespread in Germany, reports Greenpeace: According to studies, only about 13 percent worked from home before the pandemic.
Potential determined
In the spring of 2020, this changed significantly: To protect against infection with Covid-19, around 25 percent of employees stayed in the home office. Further study results suggest that in the wake of the pandemic, about 37 percent finally began to work from home at least temporarily. “The Corona months have shown that a lot of work can be done from home without any problems,” says Greenpeace spokesman Benjamin Stephan. It is obvious that the omission of journeys to work also reduces the use of transport and thus CO2 emissions. The importance of this effect has now been assessed by the Berlin think tank IZT in a study by Greenpeace.
On the basis of data on mobility in Germany provided by the Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure, the researchers have determined how much less carbon dioxide is released by avoiding commuting kilometers. Various scenarios for the spread of home office work were calculated. The scientists have also determined the number of person-kilometers saved, which are avoided on the way to and from work.
Funding seems sensible
In the optimistic scenario, the calculations showed that if 40 percent of employees work at home for two days, around 35 billion person-kilometers per year are lost due to less commuter traffic. Roads would be significantly relieved, especially at peak times. With this widespread use of home office activities, there would also be considerable savings in CO2 emissions: they could drop by 5.4 million tons per year. That corresponds to around 18 percent of all emissions caused by commuting, reports Greenpeace. This sample calculation shows the potential of working more often from home. Because every contribution to reducing greenhouse gas emissions from traffic is important. “Teleworking protects the climate and also relieves traffic and gives employees time and flexibility,” summarizes Stephan.
The experiences of the Corona period have certainly strengthened the use of teleworking and there will be a lasting effect: Companies such as Allianz, Siemens, Google or Facebook assume that large parts of their workforce will continue to work at home in the future, reports Greenpeace. Nevertheless, it can be assumed that the level of home office activity will decline significantly again after the Corona crisis. Active countermeasures may therefore make sense.
Greenpeace therefore calls on the German government to strengthen this ecologically sensible trend and to make it socially just. “The federal government should now begin to gradually abolish the commuter allowance and invest the money freed up in attractive public transport. In this way, lower-paid employees also benefit, whose activities can be relocated to the home office less often, “says Stephan.
Source: Greenpeace, original study: https://act.gp/31c7XZP