What is a "carbon footprint" and what is the concept of purchasing offsets?

[Poiuyt]

Thank you

[Bakunin]

1. The Purchasing Offsets thing is what rich limousine liberals do

to cover up the fact that they whore up all the carbon in one day that a family would use in a week. Some of us ride bicycles around town and buddy up or just walk to help out but some people from the lucky gene club need to ride in private jets and avoid the masses in commercial airlines. I think they pay some dudes with an inordinate fear of ICE officers to plant shrubs or something in their gardens to assuage their guilt. I hope this helps.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

5. you don't have to purchase them, good thing too...

you can save your money to buy yourself a clue.

[patrice]

6. Would it be better for the rich to completely ignore their

"carbon footprint"?

In a perfect world, they'd be riding bycicles and living in smaller houses, but failing that perfection, should they just do nothing?

[seriousstan]

9. No but it is another widening between the rich and the rest.

If you have enough to pay for your excess you may indulge, below the bar....conserve.

[patrice]

10. This IS true.

For a while anyway. In something around 50 years, carbon credits won't be a choice anymore.

[walldude]

8. Yes, and rich limousine republicans who whore up all the carbon

in one day that a family would use up in a week, instead of trying to offset it, bring their rich scumbag buddies(who have since been arrested for stealing their employees pensions) into the White House to decide how to divy up all the money they are fleecing from the ignorant fucking freepers who voted them into office. Welcome to DU.

[Porcupine]

14. Unless they are burying charcoal (they're not) it's a scam.

The problem of course being that they are adding carbon in real time and gambling on sequestration.

My sister and her husband are forest biologists; the kind that have spent their whole working lives mapping, counting, investigating and otherwise striving to understand the ecology of the coastal redwood forests. They assure me that tree planting for carbon credits is a total wash.

Many areas that were previously forested 150 years ago are NOT being reforested. Fire cycles are interupted in existing forests producing catostrophic fires that burn off topsoil accumulations and prevent the formation of standing dead wood neccesary for bird habitat. Forest bogs, ponds (beaver) and stream meanders have been destroyed due to river damming and roadbuilding projects. All of these are ways that natural forests sequestered carbon where tree plantations do not.

Wikipedia seems to agree with them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_offset

Terra Preta, a method of burying charcoal in farmland to increase crop production, is the only honest method of carbon sequestration I know of. You bury charcoal and your crops grow better. The charcoal stays in the soil.


http://www.sinkswatch.org/ Would be another place to look at carbon sequestration.

The truth is that politicos don't want to tell you that you have to give up your cars and flying to Cancun every January. You do; deal with it.

[Bolo Boffin]

2. More info here

http://www.carbonfootprint.com/

And this is the company Al Gore uses:

http://www.nativeenergy.com/Splash/ClimateCrisis/ClimateCrisis.html?ClimateCrisis

[Viva_La_Revolution]

3. here ya go

Carbon footprint is a measure of the amount of carbon dioxide or CO2 emitted through the combustion of fossil fuels; in the case of an organization, business or enterprise, as part of their everyday operations; in the case of an individual or household, as part of their daily lives; or a product or commodity in reaching market. In materials, is essentially a measure of embodied energy, the result of life cycle analysis.

A carbon footprint is often expressed as tons of carbon dioxide or tons of carbon emitted, usually on a yearly basis. There are many versions of calculators available for carbon footprinting.



carbon offset is a service that tries to reduce the net carbon emissions of individuals or organizations indirectly, through proxies who reduce their emissions and/or increase their absorption of greenhouse gases.<1> A wide variety of offset actions are available; tree planting is the most common. Renewable energy and energy conservation offsets are also popular, including emissions trading credits.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_offset

[Ellipsis]

7. Emissions trading

You may find this helpful ...the concept of "purchasing carbon offsets'" takes credits off the market.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emissions_trading


Emissions trading (or cap and trade) is an administrative approach used to control pollution by providing economic incentives for achieving reductions in the emissions of pollutants . In such a plan, a central authority (usually a government agency) sets a limit or cap on the amount of a pollutant that can be emitted. Companies or other groups that emit the pollutant are given credits or allowances which represent the right to emit a specific amount. The total amount of credits cannot exceed the cap, limiting total emissions to that level. Companies that pollute beyond their allowances must buy credits from those who pollute less than their allowances. This transfer is referred to as a trade. In effect, the buyer is being fined for polluting, while the seller is being rewarded for having reduced emissions. The more firms that need to buy credits, the higher the price of credits becomes -- which makes reducing emissions cost-effective in comparison.

The overall goal of an emissions trading plan is to reduce pollution. In some cases, the cap may be lowered over time. In other systems a portion of all traded credits must be retired, causing a net reduction in emissions each time a trade occurs. In many cap and trade systems, organizations which do not pollute may also buy credits. Environmental groups that purchase and retire pollution credits reduce emissions and raise the price of the remaining credits as per the law of demand. Corporations can also retire pollution credits by donating them to a nonprofit and then be eligible for a tax deduction.

Because emissions trading uses free markets to determine how to deal with the problem of pollution, it is often touted as an example of effective free market environmentalism. While the cap is usually set by a political process, individual companies are free to choose how or if they will reduce their emissions. In theory, firms will choose the least-cost way to comply with the pollution regulation, creating incentives that reduce the cost of achieving a pollution reduction goal.

Emissions trading markets can be easier to enforce because the government overseeing the market does not need to regulate specific practices of each pollution source. However, monitoring (or estimating) of actual emissions is still required, which can be costly.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emissions_trading

[Viva_La_Revolution]

11. I don't think certain companies should be able to purchase them

especially manufacturing. :(

On the other hand, I would like to be able to sell my extras. I've gotten us down to 1/4 of average 4-person families. :)

[The Straight Story]

4. I posted a thread detailing this earlier:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x304309

[Fresh_Start]

12. basics of conservation

reduce, reuse, recycle in that order.

In terms of energy, the very best thing you can do is reduce the total amount of carbon generating energy you use. You do that by using energy efficient devices and using them the minimal effective amount of time.

The concept of purchasing offsets is paying someone else to reduce their carbon production to compensate for the amount you create. Again, this should not be used in place of reducing unnecessary usage.

There are different types of offsets. Many of them have a LONG LEAD time. For example, reforestation may take 20 years to yield the targetted reductions. I saw a KYOTO report that a full size 30-40 year old tree compensates for the carbon production from one SUV. People can buy reforestration as a carbon offset, but trees take time to grow even when you grow them in the rain forest. So when they plant a tree seedling, its more an investment for the distance future than a current offset. And, if the tree burns in a forest fire its offset is completely eliminated and it may produce more troublesome carbons than the SUV it was attempting to offset.

Many offsets have problems. But the concept isn't so terrible. But it shouldn't replace reduction in usage.

You can google the problems with different offsets. Like many fledging industries its susceptible to scams. For example, they could sell the same offset to more than one person. How do you get around that? Regulation, audits, and smart shopping for offsets.

[soothsayer]

13. A thing what sounds like a scam; modern 'indulgences' to forgive

your sins of emission (hey, I just made that up! pretty good for 2:13 a.m.)