Thought carbon offsets were a scam until I saw the numbers

I avoided buying offsets for years because I figured companies were just greenwashing. Then I audited a local forestry project in Oregon that actually sequestered 12,000 tons last year. Has anyone else found a legit offset program that backs up their claims with real data?

3 comments

3 Comments

casey1623d ago

12,000 tons sounds like a lot but when you look at the math it's barely a drop in the bucket compared to what we actually emit. I've seen forestry projects claim huge numbers and then you find out they were counting trees that were already growing for 50 years. Plus there's the whole issue of fire risk out in Oregon, one bad season and that carbon is right back in the air.

daniel59321d ago

Friend of mine worked for one of those offset companies for like 6 months. He told me they'd go out and measure these big old pines that were already there for decades and just count them as new carbon capture. When he questioned it, his boss basically said nobody checks the paperwork unless someone complains. Eventually he quit because he felt like it was all a scam.

holly_henderson8623d ago

Got burned by one of those tree planting offsets a few years back. I paid extra on a flight to plant trees in some national forest and then a year later a drought hit and half of them died before they were even established. Feels like a lot of these projects are just counting paper numbers and hoping nobody checks up on them. The whole fire risk thing in Oregon is real too, I've seen plots that were supposed to be carbon offsets just go up in smoke.