What is carbon offsetting?

Carbon offsetting is the idea of compensating your carbon dioxide emissions by making a saving elsewhere.  This can be done by voluntarily joining a carbon offset scheme.  Carbon offset schemes offer a service to offset your emissions in a way you choose to be viable and a charge is usually applied per tonne of carbon dioxide.  Many carbon offset schemes supply generalised emissions calculators so you can easily work out your emissions and the cost of offsetting them.  It must be noted that this article applies to voluntary carbon offset schemes and not to the regulated compliance market.

Why should we offset carbon?

The main reason for offsetting carbon dioxide emissions is to become carbon neutral.  By offsetting what we emit we are theoretically cancelling it out in another time and place.  Other reasons include easing the conscience – by knowing we are offsetting we can feel better about ourselves. Also carbon offsetting can be used to improve a company’s green credentials and always looks good to consumers who are increasingly aware of the impact of climate change and the need to reduce emissions.

You can offset everyday emissions such as:

• Plane journeys
• Car journeys
• Household emissions
• Secondary emissions from food, fashion, furniture and electricals, recycling and recreational activities.

What schemes are available?

There are many schemes available to businesses and members of the public who wish to voluntarily offset their carbon dioxide emissions.  Several are mentioned here, but it must be noted that there are many other carbon offsetting companies which offer similar services.

Plant trees

There are lots of carbon offset schemes which will plant trees on your behalf.  It is worth shopping around so that you can choose where the trees are planted and negotiate costs.  There are some carbon offset schemes like Carbon Footprint [1] who give you the choice to reforest areas in Kenya (£7.50 per tonne) or choose to plant trees in your local region in the UK (£11.50 per tonne).  Others such as Climate Care [2] do not plant trees at all as they do not see planting trees as a solution to combating climate change.

Invest in green technologies

Investing in green technologies such as hydroelectric dams, wind power and landfill to gas plants are all valid technologies that can help to produce power in a cleaner and less carbon dependent way and can count towards carbon off-setting.  However, consideration must be taken to the carbon dioxide emissions that would be produced to develop and build any of these systems.  In the long term, it would be hoped that the projects would become carbon neutral over time.  BP currently offer this sort of offset, for carbon dioxide produced by driving and charge £5.46 per tonne [3].

Family planning

There is a new breed of carbon offsetting scheme called PopOffsets [4] championed by the Optimum Population Trust.  This costs £10 per tonne of carbon dioxide and provides a way for the off-setter to invest in family planning in the developing and developed world. They suggest that using family planning will help to address the impact of population growth and that the more people there are, the more carbon dioxide will be produced through the use of it over their lifetime.  They argue that a non-person can have no carbon footprint (and this can have a compound beneficial impact because of the non-descendents) [5].  Therefore by investing in family planning you are off-setting your carbon because you are helping to keep the world population down.

Points to consider

Several inconsistencies arise out of carbon offsetting.  Firstly there is evidence to suggest that some carbon offset schemes are not as good as once thought.  For example, findings from the Free Air Carbon Enrichment project which were published in 2007, were a blow to the carbon-offsetting industry.  They found that trees bathed in extra carbon dioxide grew more tissue, but did not necessarily store significant extra quantities of carbon, but that the tree’s capacity to absorb the gas depended on water and nutrient levels [6].  Only those with the highest water and nutrient availability stored enough carbon dioxide to offset the effects of global warming.

Secondly, offsetting your emissions in another part of the world does not help the fact that you are still releasing carbon dioxide in your local (or national) environment.  By offsetting the emissions on the other side of the world will not make the atmosphere above your head any greener or make the problem of emissions go away.

When offsetting emissions from plane journeys, carbon offsetting does not take into account the effect of carbon dioxide being released at high altitudes, which can have a much more devastating effect on the atmosphere and can contribute significantly more towards climate change.

Carbon offsetting misses the bigger picture.  Carbon dioxide is one of several greenhouse gases and offsetting forgets about these other gases such as methane.

Offsetting plays a role in combating climate change by providing the investment for new forests, new green technology and more obscure global ventures such as family planning.  However, it has to be done in conjunction with other carbon saving efforts, such as reducing carbon dioxide emissions (and other greenhouse gases) at source and by changing public perception and behaviour.

[1] Carbon Footprint (2010) http://www.carbonfootprint.com/offsetprojects.html

[2] Climate Care (2010) http://www.jpmorganclimatecare.com/

[3] BP (2010) http://www.bp.com/sectiongenericarticle.do?categoryId=9030004&contentId=7054955

[4] Pop Offsets (2010) http://www.popoffsets.com/index.php

[5] Burton, D.  Go green, don’t have m(any) children.  The Environmentalist. Issue 45.  April 2010.  Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment.

[6] The Telegraph (2007) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1560675/Carbon-offsetting-schemes-not-so-green.html