The carbon offset market has exploded ever since California signed a mandatory CO2 cap and trade law into effect. Cap and Trade is a market-based environmental control system where regulators set the total amount of pollution (CO2 in this case) that companies can produce. Companies then buy and sell those pollution credits. This creates an incentive to devise greener technologies (and sell excess credits). Many environmentalists think this is a vast improvement on the old "Command and Control" system where regulators told companies how much pollution they could produce and enforced the mechanisms to reduce pollution. If companies exceed their allowable amount, they can "offset" their CO2 by investing in projects that reduce CO2 in other ways. This is where the controversy begins.
Companies have been offsetting their CO2 footprint with tree-planting in Michigan and Brazil, wind farms in India and China, and methane gas capture farms around the country. Why are their projects so far away from California? Simple: Cost! It costs $300 to plant a tree in a Sacramento-area park and have it maintained for 3 years. It costs $1 to plant a small tree in Brazil. Many argue there is nothing wrong with this philosophy. Companies are offsetting the carbon they produce outside of California because it is too expensive here. It's too expensive in California because of a high cost of living and California already has strong environmental protections (forests are protected, trucks have low emissions, etc.) The downsides of solving this global problem without local solutions falls into two main camps. Communities near polluters experience an undue burden (think of a house near a factory) and polluters sometimes find it cheaper to purchase offsets than to reduce pollution. Overall, environmentalists argue Carbon Offsets offer a false sense of security/morality; offsets don't make pollution disappear.
Let's refocus on offsetting individual CO2 footprints (instead of corporate footprints). In fact, let's zoom in even further on Sacramento consumers (the audience for the app Code4Sac will be building). Sacramento consumers need an easy retail solution. Carbonfund.org and other websites offer US and internationally based offset programs but none that focus on Sacramento. Several Universities and other institutions offer offset programs that guarantee the work will be done locally. The College of William and Mary guarantees a certain amount of carbon offset (on campus) based on the size of your donation. You can see their program at Offset.wm.edu. Other national programs with international offsets are listed on Carboncatalog.org.
None of these programs are in the Sacramento area. So the question remains, how do you offset your carbon globally AND help locally? And is that important? My recommendation would be to offset part of your CO2 footprint by donating to carbonfund.org. You can also donate to the sustainable management and replanting of West Coast forests at Pacificforests.org. Another option would be donate to the creation of green technology via the UC Berkeley Climate Action Committee (http://sustainability.berkeley.edu/calcap). Of course, climate action committees don't guarantee offsets. Lastly, many websites offer ways to reduce your carbon footprint, which in turn reduces the need for offsets. Taking shorter showers, riding your bike instead of driving, and using less air conditioning are a few small, incremental ways to reduce your carbon footprint. The answer to how to reduce your CO2 footprint globally and locally is, of course, quite complex and personal. If only there was a local Sacramento offset company....Personally, I would donate even if they were for-profit. Then again, you might be in the camp that offsetting locally is just not what makes offsetting important.
I hope my blog helped you choose. Please post a comment if you have any thoughts or questions. You can also join Code4Sac which meets at the Sacramento Hackerlab every Wednesday night 6-9pm.
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