FAQ

Any organization with a unique domain name can sign up for using GET. Simply click the “sign up” button on the top right of the home page and provide very basic information and get your access! Do not forget to verify your email address. It is for FREE.

If you are the first user signing up to represent your organization, i.e. the domain name does not exist in the GET database, you are requested to upload documents for Know Your Company (KYC) check. Once the operations team has verified your company information, we will approve your organization and you will be able to access the GET portal and invite your colleagues to join. After the first user from an organization has been approved, KYC check is no longer needed for following users from the same organization.

The first version of GET only accepts organizational users to sign up. Individual users with personal email addresses (domain name of gmail.com or yahoo.com etc.) are not being accepted for now. We hope to open the portal for individual users based on the lessons learnt from organizational users.

The GET portal can be used free of cost by anyone. However, if you would like the GET to store the data related to your event for the long term so you can review it in the future for reference, comparison or other purposes, there is a one-time charge of USD 9.99 per event. If this fee is not paid, you will lose the access to the event’s data after 180 days.
For users from the United Nations, there is no cost to store the data.

Yes. The assessment of sustainability and GHG emissions of an event, especially mega events, is a complex process. GET is designed to be a collaboration platform which allows coworking by a group of people within or between organizations. Currently, cross-organization staff can only become observer of the event during the assessment period but in the future version, the tool will likely be open for more collaborations, particularly in supply chain management.

The Green Events Tool (GET) is an integrated web-based assessment platform conceived and designed to evaluate the sustainability and environmental performance of events. Based on its three modules, GET can facilitate event organizers to calculate the carbon footprint of their proposed events in a complete, accurate and consistent way. By answering the questionnaire, GET guides the event organizer for taking mitigation actions towards a high level of sustainability. GET can generate the report based on the data provided and facilitate event organizers in getting their events certified by a third-party.
GET cannot replace the event managers’ work on collecting activity data and choose appropriate emission factor from the GET database. The first version of GET does not provide the solutions for mitigation measures.

The Checklist of the GET is designed to help guide users on ways to improve the sustainability of their events. It contains a number of possible actions that can be implemented in different areas of event planning and delivery. The actions are presented in the form of questions that the user needs to answer, usually with a Yes/No format.

The Checklist contains some mandatory questions representing the basic measures to improve sustainability. The rest of the questions are optional, and can be used as users get more experienced in event sustainability and depending on the resources they have available.

The optional questions are also used to rate the level of sustainability of an event. When more optional questions are answered, more actions are taken to improve the sustainability performance of the event, resulting in higher rating. The levels that can be achieved are “Green”, “Bronze”, “Silver” and “Gold”. See here for more details.

The Carbon Footprint Calculator allows the user to perform calculations related to the carbon footprint of the event before, during and after the event. In this way, the user may want to perform estimated calculations before the event (ex-ante) and then compare it to the calculations after the event (ex-post), once all of the real data is obtained, and compare both.

The purpose of this exercise may be to see the impact of sustainability measures on the overall carbon footprint, or to verify assumptions about footprint to be generated.

The basic option of the calculator is designed to calculate a quick, ballpark figure for the GHG emissions that can be expected from an event. It can also be used by those that are just getting started in understanding how to calculate the carbon footprint of an event.
The advanced option provides more accurate, tailored and complete calculation of an event’s carbon footprint. It should be used by anyone who wants to get detailed information about the footprint, those seeking third-party verification and certification, or those experienced in carbon footprint calculation.

Eventually, all users should aim to use the advanced option.

This depends on the scope of the carbon footprint that the user defines. There is no globally accepted standard on how to set the boundaries for the GHG emissions of an event. The GET’s Carbon Footprint Calculator has been designed to adapt to different definitions of the boundaries of an event’s footprint. In this way, the calculations can be flexibly adapted to different methodologies or approaches.

For example, some event organizers may not consider emissions associated with air travel not paid by them. The GET’s calculator allows them to leave out this source of emissions from their calculation.

Please refer to the methodology document to learn about the calculation algorithm, assumptions and other relevant information on the calculation of GHG emissions.

The Green Building Module of the GET allows the user to do basic evaluation of the sustainability of the buildings used for the event, allowing the user to go an extra mile by considering venue sustainability and green building aspects.

The GET can incorporate the sustainability evaluation of temporary and permanent structures.

Users of the GET can choose to obtain a “certificate” for their event as one of the final results of their work with the tool (the other final result is the report). If the data entered in the checklist, the carbon footprint calculator and the building module (depending on what the user decided to use) is not verified by a third-party, the “certificate” will be a “self-declaration”. This means that all information is declared by the user, who has the sole responsibility for the accuracy of the results claimed in the report.

There is no cost to generate a self-declaration report through the GET.

Users of the GET can choose to obtain a “certificate” for their event as one of the final results of their work with the tool (the other final result is the report). If the data entered in the checklist, the carbon footprint calculator and the building module (depending on what the user decided to use) is verified by a third party, the user will obtain a certificate confirming the suitability, accuracy and completeness of the data and the corresponding calculations.

There is a cost to complete a third-party verification to obtain the certificate as indicated in this webpage.

The GET has been designed to fulfil the basic principles of credible sustainability reporting, in alignment with global standards: accuracy, completeness, consistency, transparency, and comparability. It also fulfils the principle of continuous improvement, as users can make more accurate and complete calculations as their expertise in the use of the GET and its calculations advances, and with the foreseen improvements and developments of the GET.

With these basic principles already considered, the GET will further develop guidance on how its use aligns with standards such as ISO 20121, allowing demonstration of compliance with various elements of the standard. Many of the requirements of ISO 20121 are covered through the GETs checklist.