My company, Direct Learn Services, has used Webcrossing Community for about eight years now. We use it to run short, time limited online conferences – typically, they last around four days. These are hugely popular, and I’ll describe in another post a little about how they work. But in this post, I want to illustrate a couple of points about the financial and environmental benefits of using online conferencing systems. The figures I’ll use aren’t mine – they come from an Athabasca University study, published in the Canadian Journal of Learning and Technology, Spring 2009. The paper can be seen at http://www.cjlt.ca/index.php/cjlt/article/view/521/254.
The study looked at our 2008 Supporting Deaf People online conference. This is totally online, and had 241 participants from 18 countries – a truly international event, running 24 hours a day. The cost to delegates was £50 each (at the rates at the time of the study, about 69 USD). The study examined the carbon footprint and costs which would have been generated by an equivalent physical conference.
Environmental costs
I don’t want to go into the detail of how these were calculated – those interested can refer to the paper linked above. The paper assumed that if held as a physical event, the conference would be in London (we are a UK-based company). So, calculating emission costs for airplane travel for non-UK delegates, travel within the UK for UK delegates, and hotel emissions, the total CO2 emissions would be 431.09 metric tons – or around 1.79 metric tons per participant. (The equivalent in US tons is around 475 and 1.97). So – given that emissions from attending via your computer at home or your normal workplace are very minimal indeed - this represents a massive saving. To put it into context, the average annual emissions per capita in 2005 for a US citizen were 19.52 – so the conference would represent a large proportion of that. In fact, for less developed countries, the proportion is much higher – Brazil’s per capita emissions were 1.76 metric tons – less than emitted for the attendance at a four day conference held in London!
Financial costs
The financial cost, averaged out per delegate, was calculated as 2168 USD – this was primarily travel and accommodation. This compares with the actual cost to delegates of 69 USD – another huge saving.
Was the experience as good?
It could be argued that whilst the physical event costs more, delegates would get a lot more from it. In fact, we don’t agree with this, and I will, in another post, demonstrate that levels of participation in our online conferences, and satisfaction with them, are generally higher than in physical conferences (though, of course, you don’t get the chance to spend a few days being a tourist in London!).
Conclusion
Of course, it’s not quite that simple. The reality is that had we decided to run this conference physically, it would never have happened. It would have been way too expensive in terms of both time and money. Our delegates are not highly paid businessmen used to jetting around the world. They are ordinary people, not paid massive amounts of money, and not able to afford to pay nearly 2200 USD for a short conference. And this brings us to the real benefit of online conferencing – it enables people who could not go to a physical conference to attend online and to get first class professional development, at a minimal cost to themselves and to the environment. It gives them opportunities they would not otherwise have had.
The study looked at our 2008 Supporting Deaf People online conference. This is totally online, and had 241 participants from 18 countries – a truly international event, running 24 hours a day. The cost to delegates was £50 each (at the rates at the time of the study, about 69 USD). The study examined the carbon footprint and costs which would have been generated by an equivalent physical conference.
Environmental costs
I don’t want to go into the detail of how these were calculated – those interested can refer to the paper linked above. The paper assumed that if held as a physical event, the conference would be in London (we are a UK-based company). So, calculating emission costs for airplane travel for non-UK delegates, travel within the UK for UK delegates, and hotel emissions, the total CO2 emissions would be 431.09 metric tons – or around 1.79 metric tons per participant. (The equivalent in US tons is around 475 and 1.97). So – given that emissions from attending via your computer at home or your normal workplace are very minimal indeed - this represents a massive saving. To put it into context, the average annual emissions per capita in 2005 for a US citizen were 19.52 – so the conference would represent a large proportion of that. In fact, for less developed countries, the proportion is much higher – Brazil’s per capita emissions were 1.76 metric tons – less than emitted for the attendance at a four day conference held in London!
Financial costs
The financial cost, averaged out per delegate, was calculated as 2168 USD – this was primarily travel and accommodation. This compares with the actual cost to delegates of 69 USD – another huge saving.
Was the experience as good?
It could be argued that whilst the physical event costs more, delegates would get a lot more from it. In fact, we don’t agree with this, and I will, in another post, demonstrate that levels of participation in our online conferences, and satisfaction with them, are generally higher than in physical conferences (though, of course, you don’t get the chance to spend a few days being a tourist in London!).
Conclusion
Of course, it’s not quite that simple. The reality is that had we decided to run this conference physically, it would never have happened. It would have been way too expensive in terms of both time and money. Our delegates are not highly paid businessmen used to jetting around the world. They are ordinary people, not paid massive amounts of money, and not able to afford to pay nearly 2200 USD for a short conference. And this brings us to the real benefit of online conferencing – it enables people who could not go to a physical conference to attend online and to get first class professional development, at a minimal cost to themselves and to the environment. It gives them opportunities they would not otherwise have had.
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