Carbon Credits
Considerate Offsetting
We’ve put together some notes on carbon credits
If, like us, you’ve been overwhelmed by the volume and range of carbon credit schemes on offer, we hope the following offers some insight. While carbon credits are not a fix – they’re no silver bullet – there are instances where they should be used. They needn’t only be purchased to offset your emissions, either – the projects listed here are each worthy of investment. Many artists use carbon credit schemes to offset essential travel. We do, in our own activities.
“If we are serious about averting catastrophic planetary changes, we need to reduce emissions by 45% by 2030. Trees planted today can’t grow fast enough to achieve this goal. And carbon offset projects will never be able to curb the emissions growth, while reducing overall emissions, if coal power stations continue to be built and petrol cars continue to be bought, and our growing global population continues to consume as it does today.
This is not to say that carbon offset projects should stop, quite the opposite. We must continue to plant trees and protect forests and peatlands. Renewable energy and energy efficiency projects are critical and offset schemes play an important role in funding and upscaling them.”
For smaller scale actions – for example, essential travels that we make in our daily lives and acts that cannot be avoided – we see carbon credit schemes as better than doing nothing. But we must be wary. Carbon credit schemes are not a cure-all. They’re a bandage rather than a fix and they certainly shouldn’t be purchased as a free pass. If, for example, an artist is considering using carbon credits to offset the delivery of an artwork, perhaps in the first instance it might be less impactful to hire an electric or hybrid vehicle for the day or use a trusted green courier.
There’s no Compare the Market for carbon offsetting and as a result, we risk purchasing carbon credits from the biggest names, often left unsure of where our investment is going, adding further confusion to what is already a complicated issue. Indeed, top search results at the time of writing feature carbon offsetting schemes by the biggest polluters themselves, with oil companies themselves appearing uppermost [true of August 2019].
→ offset.climateneutralnow.org
A good first port of call is the United Nations Carbon Offset Platform. Here, the UN has listed certified local green initiatives around the world. From programmes to deliver solar water heaters, to wind-farm development; from rice-husk biomass fuel plants, to hydroelectric dam investment. If the functionality of this website works for you, and you spot a project you’d like to support, then look no further.
→ terrapass.com
Terrapass works with several different types of projects around America. They work with farms to make the best use of animal waste, help create solar farms, and install methane capture in landfills.
→ co2nsensus.com
The UK based charity C02nsensus has a well-designed platform offering investment in projects worldwide. They make investment in a project quick and easy.
→ cooleffect.org
Similarly, Cool Effect offers a clear range of investment options. Their processes guarantee projects that are scientifically and financially strong and ethically sound. The work they support is also “100% additional”, meaning that the reduction in carbon emissions would not have happened under any other circumstances.
→ goldstandard.org
Gold Standard aims to go a step further. The organisation was established by the WWF and other international NGOs to ensure projects that reduced carbon emissions featured the highest levels of environmental integrity and also contributed to sustainable development.
→ greenlandtrees.org
Investment in a project through any of the aforementioned platforms is a safe bet; all their projects are certified, and you can rest assured your money will be spent responsibly. But if the choice on these platform-style websites is overwhelming (there are many projects listed; making a decision can be difficult) then let’s look at a smaller project. Greenland Trees is a localised project planting native trees within an arboretum in a former, heavily degraded military base in Narsarsuaq, south Greenland. They work heavily with the local community, in a location already bearing witness to extreme climate change.
