Becoming carbon-neutral is “not as expensive an undertaking as most people looking at it would imagine,” Lindsay said. In South Australia, green power costs around 20% more than traditional forms of power, and that is the dominant cost.
The positive publicity benefits of the decision likely outweigh any extra financial burden, he added.
“Naturally it's more expensive to operate this way, but I guess this is part of the point,” he said. “At the end of the day we make choices about how we live and how we run our businesses, and Internode's choice is to be socially and environmentally responsible.”
Although several factors - such as Internode's size and status as a privately-owned company – helped the transition towards carbon-neutral status, the option was open to the entire industry, Lindsay said.
“Any telecom company can do what we've done,” Lindsay said. “It's not as big a challenge as it looks. It comes down to the fundamental question – do the shareholders of the business care more about the dividend this year, or about the long-term impact of people on the planet?”