How to make a climate-friendly mug?

Kenya is a pioneer of green energy - with over 90% of its electricity coming from renewable sources. This comes from wind, hydroelectric power, and, most importantly, geothermal energy sourced from Kenya's Rift Valley. This spectacular tectonic feature slicing through East Africa is famed for its wildlife and home to many a hippo. It also generates so much heat that it could make Kenya a global hub for zero-carbon manufacturing in the age of climate change.

Already Kenyan horticulture uses the heat for greenhouses, and tea processing uses it dry tea leaves. So how about pottery? The lion's share of the carbon budget for ceramics comes from the kiln, especially in the USA where barely 20% of energy is renewable. By using Kenya's clean energy, we can reduce that to almost zero.

We do then have the additional carbon cost of transporting the mug to the USA. If we send the mugs by ship, then this is insignificant compared to the savings made by using Kenya's green energy and we can claim a climate-friendly product. This must be our standard practice.

For our first batch, we promised delivery by Christmas and after various delays we reluctantly conceded to freight them by plane. These mugs will end up with a similar carbon budget to one fired in the USA. We have offset this by purchasing 1 tonne of CO2 mitigation from HomeBiogas, which helps Kenyan dairy farmers to capture the methane from cow manure to use for cooking dinner instead of cooking the planet. Still, the future of manufacturing has to be carbon reduction not offsetting. We owe it to the hippos (and all our children).