Carbon Negative: A theatre performance that exposes climate colonialism

Next performance in Hamburg, 17 and 18 October 2025.

PHOTO Credit: Finn Works.

“Carbon Negative” is a theatre performance produced by Flinn Works, in Germany. The premiere was in Berlin in June 2025. The next performance is on 17 and 18 October in the Lichthof Theater in Hamburg.

The performance demonstrates how the idea of buying a carbon credit to plant trees in Kenya in order to continue flying guilt-free is both climate colonialism and a farce.

Here’s Flinn Works’ description of the performance:

Are you ashamed of flying? Do you have complexes about the environment? Do you want to reduce your carbon footprint, but you don’t know how? Then come to Carbon Negative! This performance is not only climate-neutral, but climate-positive. Your visit will actively contribute to improving our carbon footprint because we will overcompensate our harmful emissions.

Flinn Works presents innovative ideas and certified options from the CO₂ compensation lab: including classic methods, such as reforestation and solar stove projects, but also new approaches, such as enhanced rock weathering, algae cultivation, direct air capture and storage and crypto coins based on AI-controlled monitoring of the Amazon.

The clock is ticking. Our climate budget is almost exhausted. We can no longer afford to wait for perfect solutions or systemic change. Perhaps the 1.5 degree target would still be achievable if we use smart technologies on a larger scale and made them more marketable? Or do such environmental projects ultimately just comprise greenwashing and green colonialism?

Join in with the thinking, the decision-making! For a better future!

Measuring Flinn Works’ greenhouse gas emissions

In a short video promoting the opening performances at the Sophiensæle in Berlin, Sophia Stepf, artist director for Flinn Works, describes part of the idea behind “Carbon Negative”:

For Carbon Negative, we wanted to know how much greenhouse gas does a regular Flinn Works production actually emit? That’s why we didn’t reduce but measured. We are measuring:

1. Mobility. Who travels from where to where and with which means of transport.

2. Electricity and heat in the rooms where we work. These are our work rooms, the warehouse, the rehearsal room, and the performance room in the Sophiensæle.

3. Technology we use, which is mainly our smartphones and our laptops.

4. Our digital footprint. How much do we google? How much do we zoom? How much do we stream? And how many images and videos do we download?

5. Purchases. What do we buy for the production?

And then we want to know what does it cost us to buy our way out of this climate debt with carbon credits?

The performance involves collecting data from the audience. How did the audience get to the theatre? How far did they travel? The greenhouse gas emissions of those that travelled by rail or car are calculated and added to production teams’ emissions.

“Climate colonialism”

According to a review by rbb24.de, the first performance was responsible for 315 kg CO₂. That’s approximately the same as one person would emit with a return flight from Berlin to Munich.

The performers, Konradin Kunze and Andi Otto, asked the audience what they know about carbon trading and who would help them by finding a nice project to invest €100 of Flinn Works’ money to “offset” the emissions?

Two women end up on the stage searching on laptops for possible projects.

Meanwhile, Kunze and Otto tell the story of how the carbon trading company South Pole was founded. And how Renat Heuberger, one of the co-founders, became a millionaire by cashing in on this false solution to the climate crisis.

Verra’s “philosophical mind games” that replace exact calculations appear in the performance, as does the scandal of the Kariba REDD project in Zimbabwe. Renat Heuberger resigned from South Pole when a series of investigative journalists exposed the tens of millions of fake carbon credits that had been sold from the Kariba REDD project.

The “Carbon Negative” performance includes recorded interviews with Jutta Kill of World Rainforest Movement and Mordecai Ogada, a Kenyan carnivore ecologist and conservation writer.

“Flinn Works unmasks the capitalist pipe-dream that we can continue over-consuming and buy your way out of the climate crisis with enough capital,” rbb24.de writes.

And Mordecai Ogada describes carbon trading as “climate colonialism”.

Flinn Works’ performance is not dry, well-meaning, educational theatre. Instead, rbb24’s review explains that it works with “visuals, electronic music, videos — and humour”. The stage is built like a laboratory where algae and small moss balls are cultivated and then set on fire.

Flinn Works describes the performance as,

A cross between lab, interaction and audiovisual performance, Carbon Negative opens a space for reflection, stimulation and possibilities for action.

I haven’t seen it myself, but if you’re anywhere near Hamburg on 17 or 18 October, REDD-Monitor’s suggestion would be to go to the Lichthof Theater to see “Carbon Negative”. It looks like a very entertaining and educational evening.