Organizers of the London 2012 Olympic Games dropped a plan to cut carbon emissions during the sporting showcase, abandoning a pledge made when it defeated eight other cities to host the event. 
 
 Games administrators will “no longer pursue formal offsetting procedures” to mitigate Olympics-related emissions, documents posted on the London Olympics website said. 
 
 David Stubbs, the head of sustainability at the London Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympics Games, or LOCOG, said in an interview that going ahead with the plan would have shifted the focus away from Britain. 
 
 Scrapping the plan, which would have involved offsetting the emissions generated by the Games by investing in clean- energy projects in poor countries, underlines how carbon-saving measures are being overlooked to save money as the U.K. cuts spending and increases taxes amid an economic slowdown. By ditching the program, LOCOG may avoid spending as much as 2.7 million pounds ($4.4 million), according to prices quoted by brokers MF Global. 
 
 “Officially, if you want to go down certified carbon- offsetting all projects have to be overseas, so if we plant a lot of trees in Essex that just doesn’t count,” said Stubbs, referring to the English county. “Because the Games are in the U.K., we wanted to maximize the Games locally. Doing formal offsetting would be diverting things.” 
 
 3.4 Million Tons 
 
 LOCOG estimated the construction of facilities, the staging of the Games and transportation of staff and athletes, dating back to the day when the Games were awarded to London, would collectively generate more than 3.4 million metric tons of greenhouse-gas emissions, including 438,000 tons from the staging of the event. 
 
 Organizers of the Games had intended to compensate for some of the greenhouse-gas emissions generated by the construction and staging of the Olympics by purchasing so-called carbon offsets, or credits, which are created by funding clean- technology projects in developing countries. Greenhouse-gas emissions are blamed for climate change. Offset projects generate carbon credits when they reduce pollution versus a business-as-usual scenario. 
 
 Dropping the plan is “not fair,” said Darren Johnson, a Green Party member of the London Assembly, the governing authority for the capital. “Obviously we want the Olympics to benefit London, but environmentally they should be a green Olympics to benefit the whole world as well.” 
 
 ‘Behavior Change’ 
 
 According to LOCOG’s 2011 sustainability report, ways of reducing emissions at source range from using “design to reduce or eliminate emissions at source” to “promoting behavior change.” 
 
 “We’re not doing an offsetting program for the totality of the Games,” Stubbs said. “We never said we would have a total offsetting program. It’s a wider approach to compensate for residual emissions.” 
 
 Instead of buying carbon credits itself, LOCOG appointed BP Plc’s Target Neutral unit to offset the expected 34,000 tons of CO2 generated through travelling to and visiting the Games. 
 
 BP Target Neutral is a not-for-profit company that works to “reduce, replace or neutralize carbon emissions from transport,” according to its website. Target Neutral will also offset the pollution from 5,000 official Games vehicles, and advise and support Games visitors on how to reduce their carbon footprint, the website said. 
 
 ‘Direct Impacts’ 
 
 BP will source offsets from one project from each of the continents taking part in the sports event, Sheila Williams, a BP Target Neutral spokeswoman in London, said in an e-mail. 
 
 “We did look at offsetting but as the program progressed and we better understood our carbon footprint, we felt our effort and resources should be focused on managing direct impacts within our control, avoiding and reducing emissions,” Adrian Bassett, a LOCOG spokesman, said in an e-mail. 
 
 Olympics chiefs made additional green commitments including supplying 20 percent of electricity to the Park via local renewable energy sources. 
 
 In June 2010, the Olympic Delivery Authority, the public organization responsible for developing and constructing new Games’ venues and infrastructure, was forced to abandon plans for a 2-megawatt wind turbine in the Olympic Park because it contravened health and safety regulations embedded in an EU Machinery Directive. Ecotricity, a U.K. green energy company, had won the contract to supply the turbine. 
 
 The cancellation trimmed the organizers’ 20 percent renewable energy target to 9 percent, which will be met by a combination of seven 5-kilowatt small-scale wind turbines in the north of the Olympic Park, a biomass energy center in the Park, and photovoltaic panels to be built on the roof of the media center. The ODA has also submitted an application to install solar cells on the media center’s car park after the Games. 
 
 With assistance from: Catherine Airlie, Mathew Carr, Alex Morales, Lananh Nguyen, Alessandro Vitelli, Steve Voss. Editors: Alessandro Vitelli, Randall Hackley. 
 
 To contact the reporter on this story: Sarah Halls at Shalls@bloomberg.net 
 
 To contact the editor responsible for this story: Stephen Voss at sev@bloomberg.net ||||| The prime minister has hit back at comments from the US presidential candidate Mitt Romney querying Britain's readiness for the Olympics, urging the country to "put its best foot forward" and ensure they are remembered as "the friendly Games". 
 
 On a visit to the Olympic Park with the London 2012 organising committee chairman, Lord Coe, before Friday's opening ceremony, Cameron said the Games were an opportunity to promote Britain despite the gloomy economic backdrop. 
 
 "This is a time of some economic difficulty for the nation, everyone knows that. But look at what we're capable of achieving even at a difficult economic time. Look at this extraordinary Olympic Park, built from nothing in seven years," he said. 
 
 Romney said the fallout from the G4S security fiasco and a threatened strike by immigration officials were "disconcerting" and questioned whether British people would get behind the Games. 
 
 "Do they come together and celebrate the Olympic moment? And that's something which we only find out once the Games actually begin. It is hard to know just how well it will turn out," said Romney. 
 
 But Cameron, who was due to meet Romney later on Thursday, said: "In terms of people coming together, the torch relay demonstrated that this is not a London Games, this is not an England Games but this is a United Kingdom Games. We'll show the world we've not only come together as a United Kingdom but are extremely good at welcoming people from across the world." 
 
 Cameron said he was going to make this point to Romney when he met him later on Thursday. 
 
 Coe said more than 13 million people had now seen the torch relay, currently in central London on the penultimate leg of its 70-day journey around the UK. 
 
 The prime minister, with an allusion to the 2008 Beijing Olympics, which London organisers have in some ways defined themselves in opposition to, said it was "not a state-run Games, it is a people-run Games." 
 
 He said the 250,000 applications for 70,000 volunteer places, plus the 8,000 ambassadors recruited by the London mayor, Boris Johnson, also showed the enthusiasm of the British public. 
 
 "It is about the people of the UK showing a really warm welcome and showing respect for all the teams and all the nationalities who come here," he said. 
 
 Cameron, who had spent the morning at a trade conference and has claimed £1bn in extra investment will be attracted by the Games, also expanded on the view of Britain he hoped the Olympics would present to the world. 
 
 "I think this is a big opportunity for Britain to put its best foot forward and say that if you want to start a business, come and visit. I hope people will see, yes, a great past, but also huge opportunities," he said. 
 
 "We're at the cutting edge of technology. Think of Tech City a few miles from here. Think of pharmaceuticals and life sciences. I hope people will see a modern and vibrant country as well as celebrating the best from our history. It is a great moment to celebrate that." 
 
 Asked whether the Games and Danny Boyle's opening ceremony, which will be watched by a predicted 1 billion people, offered an opportunity rebrand the country, Cameron said: "We don't need to rebrand Britain. Britain has a great brand. I hope people will see all the things they like about Britain's past, our history, our contributions to world development. But I also hope they will see a very open country and one that has an enormous amount to offer for the future." 
 
 In the wake of calls from Barack Obama and others for a minute's silence at the opening ceremony to mark the anniversary of the Munich Olympics tragedy, in which 11 Israeli team members were killed by Palestinian gunmen, Cameron said it was not the right forum in which to remember the deceased. 
 
 "It is right that in 2012, 40 years on from the Munich Olympics, we remember the Israeli team members who were killed there. We'll be properly marking the anniversary of that tragedy with a special commemoration and demonstrating there is no more diverse, more open, more tolerant city in the world than this one," he said.
– As part of London’s bid to host the 2012 Summer Olympics, organizers offered a plan to keep the Games green—but they’ve changed their minds. The committee will “no longer pursue formal offsetting procedures,” it said, dropping its pledge to balance carbon emissions from the Games with clean-energy investments in developing countries. Such offsetting would have “diverted” attention from Britain, says the Games’ sustainability chief. The decision also saves the organizing committee up to $4.4 million, Bloomberg reports. “If you want to go down certified carbon-offsetting, all projects have to be overseas, so if we plant a lot of trees in Essex that just doesn’t count,” says the official. “Because the Games are in the UK, we wanted to maximize the Games locally.” A British Green Party rep wasn’t happy with the shift. “Obviously we want the Olympics to benefit London, but environmentally they should be a green Olympics to benefit the whole world as well.” The move comes amid reports of mounting costs, according to the Guardian.