Re: SC37

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/6378471.stm

Carbon offsets 'harm environment'

Carbon offsets do not cut pollution, MPs were told
The current trend for "offsetting" carbon emissions by planting trees is doing more harm to the environment than good, MPs have been told.

The public is being "seriously misled" by companies peddling carbon offset schemes, campaigner Jutta Kill told the environmental audit committee.

The schemes did not reduce emissions and simply gave industry a "licence to pollute" elsewhere, she argued.

People should give money directly to climate charities instead, she said.

Under carbon offsetting schemes, air passengers pay to fund tree planting and other environmental projects in developing countries.

The practice has become a badge of honour for politicians on all sides - amongst others - over the past year, as they compete to prove their green credentials.............

.......Carbon offsetting was "an unbelievably inefficient way of reducing emissions," she argued, and its effects were impossible to verify.

In addition, "More than half" of the money given to companies selling carbon offsets went on research and administration costs, "benefiting not the climate but the burgeoning consultancy industry"...........

......."We believe it is worse than nothing because it creates the illusion, or the impression, in the public that action is being taken, while we are not really addressing the task at hand, significantly reducing greenhouse gas emissions,"........

........."And those that have set up this offset market are fully aware of this fact,".........

........"It is very hard to convey to people that when they are buying an offset they are not actually neutralising their impact on the global environment.

"They, I think quite understandably, believe what they are doing is buying something which means they are relieved from the responsibility of further action."...........

Carbon offsetting is a ridiculous illusion of action in reference to any serious measures to address burgeoning CO2 levels in our atmosphere. Any measures used as the offset mechanism will be so fraught with inefficiencies and fraudulent practices that the endeavor will show itself to be lacking any sensible merit. The world economies will continue to produce increasing amounts of greenhouse gases, and offset schemes will not slow down this reality, by any meaningful measure.