Carbon Footprint?? (1 Viewer)

saintfan

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I'm no dummy, but for the life of me I do not understand paying to erase your carbon footprint.

I just purchased a couple of airline tickets, and the airline offered an opportunity for me to pay XX dollars for compensate for my carbon footprint.

During the Demoncratic National Convention, delegates were offered the opportunity to pay XX dollars to compensate for the carbon footprint they made while in Denver. Very few delegates (maybe 40) paid.

How is paying extra dollars compensating for anything? So you plant a few extra trees, or do whatever. To me it is only a means of separating foolish people from their money without any real environmental protection.

Maybe I'm just a fool, but I just don't understand.
 
The money I think goes to someone who plants a tree for you. I think it was started by Al Gore a while back. Admitted general swipe at it but I think I am pretty close. In a word - a scam.
 
It's pretty freaking stupid. One year after we made our admissions offers in my department at school, we offered to fly out a prospective grad student to show her the campus, try to convince her to come to Duke. She turned us down - her excuse was because she had already used up her carbon footprint for the month.

I think the general concept is sound - it's worth keeping in mind that Americans use an unsustainable amount of the earth's resources and that we consume, proportionally, far, far, far more than our percentage of the world's population would indicate. But buying locally-grown produce because the stuff at Kroger used up diesel to be trucked to you - typical self-serving, liberal yuppie, feel-good BS.
 
I think the people who chop down trees should plan trees. I won't pay a company to plant any trees.
 
The money I think goes to someone who plants a tree for you. I think it was started by Al Gore a while back. Admitted general swipe at it but I think I am pretty close. In a word - a scam.

Yeah sure it does. :hihi:
 
Al Gore owns at least 1 company, and I believe 2, that sell carbon credits. He actually buys carbon credits from himself to offset his footprint, and of course this company pays his millions, so he's paying himself for burning energy?

In Nashville, for example, where Gore lives, the average consumption per household is 15,600 kilowatt hours per year.

Al Gore's total electric consumption in 2006: 191,000 kilowatt hours.

http://urbanlegends.about.com/od/government/a/al_gore_energy.htm
 
The idea of "carbon credits/carbon footprint" reduction is a solid idea and has some merit.

BUT its the implementation that the problem..if you produce carbon then have a way to capture it....great. The problem arises and is hypocritical because it doesn't cast 100 bucks to plant a freaking tree. Besides that there are other ways to "absorb carbon". What it comes down to is a guilt trip where you are a terrible person if you use more than your fair share and do not compensate for it. I have an issue with it because first, some are lining there pockets with "carbon money" while planting a 2 dollar tree and second the guilt trip that played to get that money in the first place.

Remove both of those issues and really whats is so wrong with it. Everyone likes trees and shade.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_offsets

Offsets are typically achieved through financial support of projects that reduce the emission of greenhouse gases in the short- or long-term. The most common project type is renewable energy, such as wind farms, biomass energy, or hydroelectric dams. Others include energy efficiency projects, the destruction of industrial pollutants or agricultural byproducts, destruction of landfill methane, and forestry projects.[5] Some of the most popular carbon offset projects from a corporate perspective are energy efficiency and wind turbine projects.[6]

Idea being, that your dollars go towards renewable energy projects which will hopefully reduce CO2 emissions in other ways (such as wind/hydor/solar/nuclear power plants, as opposed to coal)
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_offsets



Idea being, that your dollars go towards renewable energy projects which will hopefully reduce CO2 emissions in other ways (such as wind/hydor/solar/nuclear power plants, as opposed to coal)

wait, thats just.... reasonable.


carbon credits fund alternative energy. the idea being if you use x amount of energy, you pay for the same proportion of renewable energy to be introduced into the grid, thus offsetting your consumption of fossil fuels. its not a perfect system obviously because the consumer is still burning fossil fuels. however it does unarguably create renewable energy for people to use, which is reducing emissions so its better than nothing.

renewable energy is part of it, but conservation is also an important part of being environmentally responsible. so while guys like al gore are doing some good by purchasing carbon credits, they are still doing harm by consuming large amounts of energy.
 
I thin k that it just a way for some so-called environmentalists to ease their guilt by paying money. Once the energy is used it cannot be made up for later with a buck. They could just as easily pay the same money for the same projects and not use the energy they claim to be compensating for. In our society, the rich seem to think that they can fix anything with a buck.
 

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