Take My Emissions, Please

Wall Street Journal (full article available only to subscribers) ^ | 3/1/07 | Lauren Tara LaCapra

[Winged Hussar]

With a winter that brought snow to Tucson, Ariz., and 70-degree weather to New York City -- along with an Academy Award for the global-warming documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" -- climate change has become more ingrained in the public consciousness. Not everyone may be willing to overhaul their lives to accommodate the environment, but more people are opting for the rising number of options offered by companies to neutralize their "carbon footprints," meaning the amount of energy they consume.

Most carbon-offset programs require consumers to make small payments that in turn go to programs that create renewable energy or absorb carbon dioxide to counteract emissions. But while the thought of offsetting carbon dioxide is a nice gesture, it's debatable whether the small donations make a significant impact.

[Winged Hussar]

The article adds, "She opts for paperless bank statements and paid extra to offset carbon emissions for a flight she booked on Expedia.com. "All you have to do is click this box and pay $6 -- why not?" says Ms. Sader, a 36-year-old graduate student in Toledo, Ohio." Or, as P.T. Barnum allegedly put it, "There is a sucker born every minute."

The article goes on to name several organizations like nonprofit Carbonfund.org (connected via the Tides Foundation to the Soros-Occupied Government) and the for-profit TerraPass and DrivingGreen.com that will, in exchange for the money you send them, make you feel good about doing "something" to reduce global warming.

DrivingGreen.com invests the money in projects to convert methane from animal waste into renewable energy. Now (for those Kyotoists who have yet to figure it out), the way the free market is SUPPOSED to work is that investors buy stock in ventures (e.g. renewable energy) with the expectation of making a profit. Getting people to buy carbon offsets the way superstitious and illiterate medieval peasants once bought indulgences for their sins, and then investing the money in some kind of venture, is not how our economy is supposed to work.

Geoffrey Chaucer had these people pegged 600 years ago. (Note the Pardoner's concern with gold, coins, rings, and so on.)

Now, good men, God forgive you each trespass,

And keep you from the sin of avarice.

My holy pardon cures and will suffice,

So that it brings me gold, or silver brings,

Or else, I care not- brooches, spoons or rings.

Bow down your heads before this holy bull!

Come up, you wives, and offer of your wool!

Your names I'll enter on my roll, anon,

And into Heaven's bliss you'll go, each one.

For I'll absolve you, by my special power,

You that make offering, as clean this hour

As you were born.

========== Ah, here we go: ==============

Now, good men, Earth forgive you each emission,

And keep you from greenhouse gas commission.

My carbon offset cures and will suffice,

So that it brings me gold, or silver brings,

Indeed, any and all kinds of monetary things.

Bow down your heads before Al Gore's line of bull!

Over your eyes we shall now pull the wool!

Your names I'll enter on my roll, anon,

And into environmental bliss you'll go, each one.

For I'll absolve you, by my special power,

You that make offering, as green this hour

As you were born.

[loreldan]

I'm thinking about putting something up on Ebay similar to this:

I am going to burn a pile of wood every day. The item for sale is an offset. You can buy my right to burn that pile of wood for one day and in that way save that amount of carbon from being put in the air.

[Howlin]

Fascinating.

[Howlin]

Too late:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Carbon-Offset-Save-The-Planet-Stop-Global-Warming_W0QQitemZ180090707773QQihZ008QQcategoryZ31411QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

[Howlin]

http://search.ebay.com/search/search.dll?cgiurl=http%3A%2F%2Fcgi.ebay.com%2Fws%2F&fkr=1&from=R8&satitle=carbon+offset&category0=

[Cobra64]

By the end of this decade, there will by a Federal Carbon Tax. Five years after that, each state will insitute a State Carbon Tax.

And like Social Security and Property taxes, it will end up in general funds to build projects like this:

[Cobra64]

I'm going to do my part by putting these signs around my yard:

"For a start ... Don't Fart"

[posterchild]

I've got a few decades until I'm typical US retirement age, but I'm working on an idea to speed that up. If I get sufficient donations, I'll retire and purchase an ocean front ranch in the tropics where I'll promise to catch and eat only carbon neutral fish, local free range carbon neutral pork beef and chicken, plant orchards, and not commute anywhere.

[Winged Hussar]

"Each Carbon Offset Credit pays for the planting and long term care of one tree... As a thank you gift, you will recieve a certificate with your tree number and a photo of the tree. "

This sells for $40.00. For something like $12.00, I bought a crabapple tree and planted it in my back yard, where it adds to the value of MY property (while incidentally absorbing a few pounds of carbon dioxide every year).

Maybe I should sell a $40.00 carbon offset credit so I can buy my next tree or evergreen bush and have money left over.

[Howlin]

I just cannot get over this.

How does Gore set off Occidental Petroleum?

[avg_freeper]

Very nice, bravo!

[Man50D]

"There is a sucker born every minute."

This way to the egress!

[keepitreal]

... As a thank you gift, you will recieve a certificate with your tree number and a photo of the tree. "

This sells for $40.00. For something like $12.00, I bought a crabapple tree and planted it in my back yard, where it adds to the value of MY property (while incidentally absorbing a few pounds of carbon dioxide every year).

Maybe I should sell a $40.00 carbon offset credit so I can buy my next tree or evergreen bush and have money left over.

-----

Better yet, take a picture, make hundreds of copies, and sell the same tree over and over again!

[Scourge of God]

Could someone suggest ways I can increase my so-called carbon footprint? I want to make it as large and as extravagant as possible.

Then I'll tell the envirowhackos that I'm going to keep at it until they shut up!

[Publius6961]

I have a wonderful idea! I'll be rich!

But I can't mention it just yet.

Here's a hint: buy carbon debits!

: )

[GitmoSailor]

What is a Carbon Credit???...What does it look like???...How much it worth???...Where can I buy one???... Will they FeDex it to me???...This has got to be the biggest Scam that the Rats have produced!!!!....But everyone is buying it!!!!....

[The Spirit Of Allegiance]

Offset Occidental? Hey, plants absorb CO2. Watch for 'chlorophyll credits' -- Gore might try to make a retroactive tobacco tycoon fortune....

[stefanbatory]

Being the currently unemployed slob that I am, I even went through the trouble of creating a nice little Carbon Offset Certificate in Powerpoint this afternoon. I figured that if Algore, the upstanding former Vice-President can do it, why can't I? My solution to the problem would be to walk to the beach, swim out a little ways into the ocean and relieve my bladder. The nitrates I add to the water will be nutrients for algae that will then grow and absorb massive quantities of CO2 from the atmosphere! Buying the credits from me would fund the purchase of the beer needed.

[Winged Hussar]

Re: "I even went through the trouble of creating a nice little Carbon Offset Certificate in Powerpoint this afternoon."

There are people auctioning off such certificates on E-bay. And suckers are bidding for them. Al Gore & Co. have given the world a whole new racket.

[stefanbatory]

yes...I was quite crestfallen to see those links above. That and friends telling me about the "moral issues" with doing it. I guess I'll need a job or another business instead.