 |
| "I promise to meet Kyoto standards or buy carbon offsets!" |
Sweet spankin’ sustainability Batman, I’ve joined the ranks of the Kyotoers. No longer do I have to parade around in uncertainty wondering if I’m an envirobaron. We’ve reached a point in our civilization where I can now pretty accurately gauge how much greenhouse gasses I am personally responsible for emitting.
By the end of this year, I will have emitted around 11,000 pounds
of carbon dioxide according to an average of National
Geographic’s and Terrapass’
carbon calculators. (NG had me at 10,018 and Terrapass had me at 12,000 pounds
of CO2 released this year.) That isn’t great, but it’s not too
shabby for an aspiring environmentalist.
According to my calculations
last month, I found that last year individuals emitted around 15,418 pounds
of carbon dioxide on average and the acceptable level of CO2
emissions was around 6,424. So with the global population steadily increasing I
figured that people could safely emit around 6,000 pounds of carbon this year.
Obviously I didn’t make that target, however, I did purchase
5,000 pounds of carbon credits to make up for my overage. In an ideal world, we
wouldn’t have to purchase carbon credits. Our existing infrastructure would
allow us to live our lives as close to carbon neutral as possible, but because
our energy infrastructure is assy and ailing, purchasing carbon credits are a
good start for offsetting greenhouse gas emissions in the future.
How carbon credits work: You spend money today to
purchase green infrastructure projects for the future. For example, I gave my
money to the company, Terrapass, so that it could divvy up my contribution into
the various clean energy projects it provides capital for in the future. Like a
microfinancing scheme, a bunch of people pool money together to purchase or
invest in a good. Under the leadership of Terrapass a bunch of people and I are
investing in greenhouse gas trapping projects or clean energy projects that
will exist in the future.
Terrapass sells credits in 1,000 pound increments for $5.95.
To be honest, that price tag seems a bit low and arbitrary to me, but how do
you know? At the moment I’m taking a small leap of faith, assuming the money
truly gets funneled to the places it’s supposed to get funneled to and that the
carbon credit prices are fair and logical.
One day we will live in a world where there is a global cap and trade, or carbon credit market,
where prices will fluctuate depending on supply and demand. Until that day
comes, voluntary carbon purchasing for venture capital
projects will have to do for me.
