Offsetting carbon emissions

A help for the troubled mind

How much is my debt in carbon - honestly? This is a question that creeps up on us the more we accept the need for individual actions. Climate Care in the UK has developed a good web-calculator that covers most human activities in the home and at work and also allows for making use of some facilities common in non-British, European countries. The input for flights is simple since you can use the itinerary (departure and destination) data. There are a few similar calculators, but many off them require that you e.g. know how many miles your flights is, which few of us do.

Then there is, of course, the issue of what sort of offsets you should utilise where there is a reason to be cautious as has been pointed out before on this site in '10 things you should know about tree offsets'. The organisations that provide the calculators have their own offers, which are project portfolios.

There is also, in some countries, the option to buy real emission rights from the European Trading System and thereby prevent further emissions within the system. Presently, that is a bargain since the prices have dropped tremendously due to the warm winter. Prices are below 5€ per tonne of CO₂, whereas the prices for emissions in December 2008 are in the area of 15€ per tonne.