Ecopoint – What is it?
Everyone knows what a ‘Rotpunkt’ is. But what exactly is an ‘Ecopoint’? It’s a concept that extends the sense of achievement from climbing to include the journey there.
Red point? Sure, climbing a route without falling or using a piton to pull yourself up. Ecopoint? Not quite so clear. Not yet, anyway, but hopefully soon. The Ecopoint concept expands on the concept of the redpoint to include travelling there by fair means (public transport, bike, boat, on foot).
Why is this important? Because most of the emissions generated during a climbing trip come from the journey to and from the crag. On average, a car emits 15 times as much CO₂ per passenger kilometre as a train. The mission of the website www.ecopointclimbing.com is to promote and encourage sustainable mobility in climbing – through a freely accessible community platform where climbers can share information and inspire one another to climb more sustainably.
This website is a collaborative project: it’s designed for all climbers who’d like to share their knowledge of Ecopoints to inspire and inform others about climbing more sustainably. And there’s plenty of potential here in Climbers Paradise Tirol too – many of the spots are easily accessible by public transport. This is wonderfully summarised in Lena’s Sustainable Climbing Guide, which you can view there for free. Let’s add more green dots to the rock!
Find out more about Lena and her philosophy in the Climbers Paradise interview on climate-friendly climbing.
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