The surfer who became a climate hero
News · August 2026
ClimateHero was born out of a love of wave surfing. This is the story of how a single carbon calculation, done at a restaurant table on the French coast, turned a globe-trotting surfer into a climate entrepreneur.
20 to under 3
is the drop in tonnes of CO2 Robert has made to his own yearly footprint, while surfing more than ever.
2018
the year a surf trip became a company. Two million people have joined the journey since.
The idea arrived, as good ideas often do, after a day in the water.
It was 2017. Robert Sabelström and his friends had come off the waves in Biarritz, on France's Atlantic coast, and sat down to eat. Somewhere between reading the menu, a small debate broke out: mussels or fish, which was the better choice for the planet? Phones came out, someone googled it, the question faded. But Robert kept scrolling. On a whim, he ran a test to measure his own carbon footprint, and two things hit him at once.
The first: he was emitting more than 20 tonnes of CO2 a year. By any measure, he was a climate villain. The second, and the one that stuck, was that the test told him he was doing badly and then simply stopped. It asked blunt questions, delivered a verdict, and left him with nowhere to go.
The test that just told him off
The carbon calculators of the day were built by academics and environmental groups. They were accurate enough, but they were joyless, and they leaned on alarm and shame. The message Robert remembers most was the one that flashed up at the end: "Robert, you live as if we had 4.2 planets."
He is blunt about why that failed. It did not make him want to change a thing. It told him off and walked away.
A former management consultant at Accenture who had gone on to build things as an entrepreneur, Robert knew that tone and experience decide whether people act. So a question started to form. What if a test about a deadly serious subject could feel light, even fun? What if, instead of guilt, it left you wanting to do something?
A calculator with a glint in its eye
In 2018, together with his wife Anna and their daughter, Robert started ClimateHero. The premise was the opposite of what he had encountered: build on positive psychology and gentle nudging, celebrate what people already do well, then hand them a few concrete, personal steps to go further. Five minutes on your phone, a clear picture of your footprint, and a reason to keep going.
It launched into the record-breaking heat of the summer of 2018 and reached 25,000 users almost immediately. From there it roughly doubled every year.
When you think about it, it's really crazy that it would take me almost two decades and countless laps around the world before I discovered how fun surfing can be in Scandinavia. Ok, the water is cold and it is very inconsistent, as it requires a storm to start pumping. But when my passion is accessible via an electric car trip, why would I increase my carbon footprint and jump on a plane?
Robert Sabelström
Founder & CEO
ClimateHeroCold Hawaii
Here is the part that surprised even him. Surfing, the low-impact sport he loved, had quietly made him a heavy emitter. Not the surfing itself, but the flights. He used to take at least four surf trips a year, and at least one was long haul, often to Australia. Chasing the best waves meant chasing them across the planet.
So he went looking closer to home, and found them. There are proper waves along the west coasts of Sweden, Norway and Denmark. On a stretch of the Danish coast that locals call Cold Hawaii, Robert and his family have now spent three summers running, reachable by train and by electric car pool. The water is colder and moodier, and it takes a storm to get it firing. But it turns out you do not have to circle the globe to find a good break, and the ones near home are perfect for teaching the kids.
Today Robert surfs almost as many days a year as he ever did. He just does it in a wetsuit, closer to home.
From 20 tonnes to under three
The surfing was only part of it. Over a few years, Robert cut his own footprint from over 20 tonnes to under three, and he is clear that most of the changes made life better, not smaller:
- Getting around. Going car-free was the surprise favourite. He mostly cycles now, is in better shape for it, and takes the train or an electric car pool for longer trips. No more winter tyres, parking, or worrying about resale value.
- Food. He could not cook a vegetarian meal to save his life, so the family started with meal-kit deliveries and he learned. Around half his meals are now vegetarian, with a noticeable health benefit. Beef, which carries roughly ten times the footprint of poultry or fish, became a luxury he eats at most once a month.
- Waste. He turned cutting food waste into something close to a sport, freezing leftovers and throwing the occasional "leftovers party" rather than binning food.
- Buying less. The tailor, the bike workshop and the repair shop now get more of his time than any store, and he starts most purchases on second-hand sites. Repairing and reusing, he says, gives a deeper kick than buying new.
The bigger wave
Robert's own story is really the whole pitch in miniature: change that starts as a sacrifice and turns into a better life, then ripples outward. ClimateHero has now helped more than 2 million households understand and commit to cutting their footprints. Together they have pledged to remove well over four million tonnes of CO2 a year, roughly the same as taking 2.5 million cars off the road.
And he is nowhere near satisfied. The company has doubled its reach year after year, with the goal of influencing 100 million households by 2030. One footprint at a time, that is how a single calculation in a surf bar becomes a wave big enough to matter.
Curious where your own footprint stands?
It takes about five minutes, and you might be surprised what you're already doing well.
- Calculate your carbon footprint and see where you land.
- Say hello if you want to bring ClimateHero to your company or community.
