Carbon offsetting has a fundamental issue - the average consumer does not truly understand what it means.
For example: if you take a flight from YUL: Pierre Elliott Trudeau Intl, Montreal, Canada to LHR: Heathrow, London, United Kingdom it would produce approximately 2.09 tonnes of CO2e. At checkout you might be given the option to offset these carbon emissions by paying a small fee. Now for the average consumer they might think that the airline has a way they can produce less carbon emissions however this is simply not the case. If you think about it in driving terms, if you drive from Point A to Point B your car may use 20 liters of gas. If a passenger contributes $10 to the price does your car use less gas? Obviously not and carbon emissions work the same way.
What the airline is doing is using that money to invest in a carbon offsetting project. Carbon offsetting projects include things like reforestation. And while I do not necessarily disagree with the concept of the projects themselves as reforestation projects and the like are good for the environment, the idea that companies can continue to do things how they have always done things by simply planting trees and pretending that makes them a greener company is dangerous. Reforestation is a great thing but it produces more CO2 to replant than if companies simply stopped destroying our planet’s forests and replanting the trees does not bring back the ecosystems that were destroyed along with it.
Carbon offsetting projects have their place in companies’ drive toward sustainability however it should not be the primary demonstration of their fight against climate change. If it is - this is essentially a greenwashing technique and the company should either take another look at their sustainability plan and change to reflect a desire to make a real change. Net zero may be a goal worth fighting for but it is but one goal in the fight to preserve the planet and if all we are doing is putting a bandaid on real issues we are facing - we inch that much closer to the end of earth’s life cycle.
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