Carbon Offset

Here's a new article from the Guardian about companies who deal in carbon offsets.

What are carbon offsets? The basic idea is that if you are responsible for emitting carbon (e.g. you take a flight to France), you can buy a service or a slice of a service that offsets the damage done: this could come in the form of tree planting, sewage clean up in a less-developed country, or directly in the form of a carbon permit.

How much does carbon offset cost? It depends on the service you're using and on how much carbon your flight emits. If you fly from Finland to France, you won't have to offset as much (it's voluntary though) as you would if you were flying to Honduras.

By buying carbon offsets, you'll be supporting renewable energies, environmental clean up services, reforestation efforts and other anti climate change measures. The schemes aren't without critics but the point is to be doing good to offset the "bad."

Who is in this business? The article talks about companies who sell carbon offset services. Each of the carbon offset firms (here are some companies in this business) gives a different number of tonnes of CO2 emitted for the same flight; as a result, the offset cost can vary ten-fold, according to the article.

How much does it cost? That depends on the number of tonnes of carbon that one is responsible for emitting (or is assumed to) and the market price for a tonne of carbon. There is no standard number of tonnes of carbon emitted per flight of X kilometers; each carbon offset firm calculates it differently. The market price for carbon, however, is quoted (and very difficult to locate, still!) somewhere on the EU Emissions Trading Scheme website. Carbon isn't like pork bellies or crude oil, though. A while back when doing research, a website with over-the-counter secondary market prices for tonnes of carbon popped up, but unfortunately the URL got misplaced. Must go through a few emails to find it, since I did forward to someone. Anyway, like the "truth is out there", carbon prices are out there somewhere, too... only both are seemingly hard to find at times...