Carbon offset programs

[Jebus]

Guests, when checking out of the resorts where I work, will find a 5 Euro per day carbon offset charge on their bill. Guests can refuse to pay this but it is very rare that someone does. The money goes to tree growing efforts in Africa.

How would you react to this charge? Do you think such programs make sense?

[ModVegan]

I think it makes sense, definitely. But I have to qualify that because I'm a cheapskate, a skeptic & a nerd, and I would definitely research said "offset" before agreeing to pay it. Or I might even decide not to pay it (because I'd want to do the research first) and donate myself to a similar organization (I use charity evaluators before agreeing to donate at stores here in Canada - every single one has its own charity, and most of them are terribly run, so I always say no and then donate myself later).

[Jamie in Chile]

Hello as you've probably noticed from previous threads, I have some knowledge on these types of global warming related topics, so no surprise I'm popping up here again!

Short answer is that they make sense provided that the programs have been carefully evaluated and most importantly of all that they haven't been used as an excuse to make fewer actual cuts to emissions, and are only used as a last resort where other travel really can't be avoided and would have been taken in any case regardless of whether offsets were available.

As for the more long-winded answer, that's coming up for those that are interested.

[Jamie in Chile]

The environmentalist George Monbiot came out against carbon offsets in 2006 (when they suddenly became popular, at least in the UK). This article http://www.monbiot.com/2006/10/19/selling-indulgences/ explains some of the problems, such as you are paying for offsets that might have happened anyway, the uncertainty of whether the claims are really true (accountability) and the fact that it will take years for the schemes to make back their gains, by which time your emissions have already taken effect. Actually it's not his best article, but I haven't seen a better one so I include it.

None of his arguments seem to be fundamental to the sense of saying carbon emissions don't work. However, it is in the interests of the companies to sell say 20 dollars and claim that offsets several tons of CO2e. It's a bold claim, and numbers are often suspiciously attractive, and the calculations are never on the website to be checked, but it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if say, companies assume that the energy efficient stoves will work for 20 years, and fail to account for a certain percentage of people whose stove will fall down and break and be left in the cupboard and never used, or steadily lose efficiency over time. Likewise if we are paying for trees to be planted do we really know if someone might come in and cut them down later?

However I reckon if you need to offset 3 tons you can just pay for what they claim as 10 tonnes and you have a picked an organization very carefully you probably have a 50/50 or better chance or having achieved a genuine offset. Just my gut feeling.

Friends of the Earth (UK) and other environmental organizations tend to be neutral to negative on these schemes, skeptical but not dead against them. https://www.foe.co.uk/faqs/why-doesnt-friends-earth-recommend-carbon-offsetting
WWF, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth put out a joint statement
http://www.agreenerfestival.com/wp-content/uploads/pdfs/WWF-GP-FoE_on_offseting.pdf
The environmental organizations key concern is that this will cause people to take less action to reduce emissions.

That's why if you are promoting the use of offsets I think it's appropriate to start and finish your argument by talking about the important of making deep cuts to emissions first and foremost.

I think make the deepest cuts that you can and then offset your annual emissions to achieve a sort of carbon neutrality that way.

A counter argument is that you should give money to the most effective charities that do the most "good" per $. It might be argued that $5000 given to the Against Malaria foundation might save 1 life on average, and that $5000 given to carbon offsetting might save only 0.1 lives (for example) and therefore we should give to the charity, doing the most good rather than doing the good that happens to be most related to the bad of our emissions.

[Jamie in Chile]

I'm like you Mod Vegan, but most people I suspect are not and will not give to a good cause until someone waves a form or a pot in front of their face.

I just looked it up and I actually calculated my personal CO2e (not including my kids) for 2016 at 6 tonnes and I paid 75 pounds to Climate Care to offset 10 tonnes. So my overall net carbon emissions for 2016 was -4 tonnes. Except 10 tonnes for 75 pounds sounds too good to be true so I don't really believe it.

I also carbon offset the flights I did for work in 2017 (which I had to do) and claimed it successfully on expenses even though there is no culture of doing this. (Of course, I couldn't have claimed a donation to the Against Malaria Foundation on this basis.)

I used Climate Care because they were more referenced in the media and they have more reports online, but I don't think you can really be sure with something like that. If anyone can challenge https://climatecare.org or criticise it successfully, or find a better organization with stronger evidence of credibility and independent reviews, I'd change. But I couldn't find a better one.

Carbon offsets work on the low hanging fruit principle. If hundreds of millions of people tried to do it all at once, it wouldn't work, because there are only so many trees that can be planted, so many methane emitting factories that can be fixed, and so many people that can benefit from energy efficient stoves and so on. So it is only a solution that can be used as an individual, provided that the solution doesn't become too popular, but doesn't offer a global solution without emissions cuts.

[brimstoneSalad]

Jamie, can you post here?
http://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=3335

This is a good topic. I made a blank page on it here; would love to copy some of what you wrote there (or you can):
http://philosophicalvegan.com/wiki/index.php/Carbon_Offset

[Jebus]

I just looked it up and I actually calculated my personal CO2e (not including my kids) for 2016 at 6 tonnes

Is there a calculator that considers what type of food you eat? The calculator I used gave me the following annual values:

House 1.99 metric tons of CO2e
Flights 1.74 metric tons of CO2e
Car 3.82 metric tons of CO2e
Secondary 5.54 metric tons of CO2e (3.22 of this is food and drink which I assume is lower since the calculator didn't ask what I eat)

I really feel awful after doing this. I drive a hybrid car which I only use for work, ride my bicycle whenever possible, eat a plant based diet, only drink local beer, travel once per year and still I get such a huge foot print.

[brimstoneSalad]

I just looked it up and I actually calculated my personal CO2e (not including my kids) for 2016 at 6 tonnes

Is there a calculator that considers what type of food you eat? The calculator I used gave me the following annual values:

House 1.99 metric tons of CO2e
Flights 1.74 metric tons of CO2e
Car 3.82 metric tons of CO2e
Secondary 5.54 metric tons of CO2e (3.22 of this is food and drink which I assume is lower since the calculator didn't ask what I eat)

I really feel awful after doing this. I drive a hybrid car which I only use for work, ride my bicycle whenever possible, eat a plant based diet, only drink local beer, travel once per year and still I get such a huge foot print.

Do you drive quite a bit? That seems to be what's hurting your total the most.
Did it ask you what kind of terrain, and if it's a hybrid?

Food and drink should be considerably lower; my guess is half.
You probably can't do much better than how you are unless you brew your own beer (it's mostly the bottles that are the issue, I would guess) and you grow your own veggies and only buy dry/shelf stable grains, beans, nuts & seeds in bulk (and supplements, of course).
Depending on where you live, you might also be able to produce your own nuts, since trees are pretty low maintenance, but that wouldn't be a big savings unless they're imported from pretty far away.

The local stuff is mostly a myth, the majority of embodied energy comes from production. There are exceptions for very large and heavy things with low embodied energy, but in those cases the local option is going to be much cheaper so it's unlikely you'd buy an import anyway.

[ModVegan]

The environmentalist George Monbiot came out against carbon offsets in 2006 (when they suddenly became popular, at least in the UK). This article http://www.monbiot.com/2006/10/19/selling-indulgences/ explains some of the problems, such as you are paying for offsets that might have happened anyway, the uncertainty of whether the claims are really true (accountability) and the fact that it will take years for the schemes to make back their gains, by which time your emissions have already taken effect. Actually it's not his best article, but I haven't seen a better one so I include it.

I loved that article back when I first read it, simply because he refers to them as "indulgences" and the religious overtones are very real.

When you said earlier that most people will donate to these causes at the register simply because they are asked - it's absolutely true. They tested this a while back on the show "Marketplace" here in Canada (sort of a consumer reports type show) and it turned out close to half will give if asked.

A counter argument is that you should give money to the most effective charities that do the most "good" per $. It might be argued that $5000 given to the Against Malaria foundation might save 1 life on average, and that $5000 given to carbon offsetting might save only 0.1 lives (for example) and therefore we should give to the charity, doing the most good rather than doing the good that happens to be most related to the bad of our emissions.

I'm personally in favour of this. We should cut our individual carbon footprint as far as possible, and then focus on what produces the most good/reduces the most suffering with our $.

That said, I'm completely in favour of effective plans for carbon sequestration, etc. - I just want to be sure that the organizations I donate to are effective.

[PsYcHo]

The problem I have with carbon offset programs is it seems to want to trade money for individual responsibility. I try to be green as much as possible, even going so far as to change every light in my house to led with dimmer capabilities to further reduce energy use. But the offset programs seems to suggest I could have kept my higher energy consuming lights if I paid to offset the use, by an agreement that someone else would use less energy on my behalf. That doesn't make sense to me.

I think offsets are a feel-good money grab. It's like someone paying a person to take the dog crap out of their yard, then placing it in a neighbor's yard instead. Same amount of crap, you just paid someone to move it so you have less crap in your own yard.