Brother Ren, who shall now be called Research Ren as he is better at it than I am, has sent in this guilt-alleviating website which allows anyone to purchase carbon neutrlaization packages.
+Carbon Neutral
Question you may have: What is a carbon neautralization package? Is it something that can only be purchased at Star Trek conventions?
Answer: These packages plant trees to help absorb the nastiness left in the air from your flight to the Maldives.
It will also calculate how much CO2 you emit on flights based on your destination as well as CO2 you emit with your car mileage.
It's a smart site, easy to use and I feel more green-angelic just for looking at it.
We're taking the Eurostar/TGV to a wedding in the south of France in 2 weeks rather than flying but we still have all of those air miles to make up for from our London-NY-San Fran-LA-London trip so looks like we'll be using this site's offerings to help to plant a small forest somewhere. (Though I do wonder how effective it really is. Better to stay off of those planes - see previous entry on why airplanes suck!)
It also lets you buy carbon neutral presents for your friends. The green brigade will love it.
And if you're a business, it has planning and packages available to reduce your emissions.
+Carbon Neutral
Question you may have: What is a carbon neautralization package? Is it something that can only be purchased at Star Trek conventions?
Answer: These packages plant trees to help absorb the nastiness left in the air from your flight to the Maldives.
It will also calculate how much CO2 you emit on flights based on your destination as well as CO2 you emit with your car mileage.
It's a smart site, easy to use and I feel more green-angelic just for looking at it.
We're taking the Eurostar/TGV to a wedding in the south of France in 2 weeks rather than flying but we still have all of those air miles to make up for from our London-NY-San Fran-LA-London trip so looks like we'll be using this site's offerings to help to plant a small forest somewhere. (Though I do wonder how effective it really is. Better to stay off of those planes - see previous entry on why airplanes suck!)
It also lets you buy carbon neutral presents for your friends. The green brigade will love it.
And if you're a business, it has planning and packages available to reduce your emissions.
Comments
carbon neutralisation schemes.
There are two types of carbon: Bottled Carbon and Free Carbon.
Bottled Carbon is the black stuff under the ground. If we leave it there, no more carbon is added to the environment.
Free Carbon is the stuff already in the soil, the seas, the plants, the animals and the air. It moves between these places all the time.
Planting a tree simply removes the carbon from the air and soil for a little while, but in the scheme of things, not for long. It returns before long to the soil and - especially if burned - the air. What it doesn't do is make up for the Bottled Carbon which adds to the Free Carbon total when it is extracted and burned.
Therefore planting trees doesn't fix the problem; it just postpones it for a few decades. More important is not to use the Bottled Carbon, which means us being more energy-efficient in every aspect of life, especially transport (as the Green Lady suggests).
Everyone loves a smart ass, I find...
I suspected there was more to it than meets the eye! If only I had paid more attention in my earth science class. (I only remember all of the good times with the bunson burners.)
Makes me want to instigate my own global 'just stay in one place for the day' carbon neutralisation program - though I don't know how many corporate partners I would get for that :)
As for not flying - we took that train all the way from London to Aix-en-Provence in our anti-plane-pollution stance. It was only about an hour longer than flying all in (though we built in a few hours each way to wander around Paris) - and so much more mellow and fun. And - the big shocker - cheaper. (tho' to be fair we refuse to go Ryan Air or Easy Jet anymore - chaos, delays, bad customer service - not worth it.)
So I highly recommend the train way for inter-European travel. And whoa, can those TGVS go!
I suspected there was more to it than meets the eye! If only I had paid more attention in my earth science class. (I only remember all of the good times with the bunson burners.)
Makes me want to instigate my own global 'just stay in one place for the day' carbon neutralisation program - though I don't know how many corporate partners I would get for that :)
As for not flying - we took that train all the way from London to Aix-en-Provence in our anti-plane-pollution stance. It was only about an hour longer than flying all in (though we built in a few hours each way to wander around Paris) - and so much more mellow and fun. And - the big shocker - cheaper. (tho' to be fair we refuse to go Ryan Air or Easy Jet anymore - chaos, delays, bad customer service - not worth it.)
So I highly recommend the train way for inter-European travel. And whoa, can those TGVS go!