Offsetting my London-NYC flight

Flying, eh? Once an unadulderated indulgence of free peanuts and beer, now a morally dubious mode of transport that accounts for 2 per cent of CO2 emissions globally and is growing fast. I've just returned from a London Heathrow to New York JFK trip for work, and have been checking out the ways I can do a tiny bit of good for the environment - and, if I'm being honest - offset my guilt a fraction too. There's a round-up of the ways you can 'offset' - make an attempt to cancel out - your flight's greenhouse gases after the click-through. [Photo by Orangeacid]

Here are four of the big offsetting options:

• Carbonneutral. Probably the most well-known of all the offsetting outfits. It has a great CO2 calculator that goes as far as listing airport names all over the world, so you can plot exactly how much planet-warming gas you've emitted by your flight: apparently 0.6 tonnes for my LHR-NYC JFK round-trip. All I have to pay is £4.44 to plant some UK trees, which seems too easy. You can also choose for the money to go into developing solar, wind and hydro projects around the world.
• Treeflights says I should pay £20 for a return, even though it doesn't know whether I've flown from Heathrow to Edinburgh, or Gatwick to Sydney. It plants trees in Wales to eat up some of the carbon from your flight. [further story here]
• CO2Balance reckons I should pay £29 for a long-haul flight - it gives London to Perth as an example. The cash goes to energy efficiency projects and tree-planting.
• Climatecare, the choice of BA and The Guardian, says I've caused 1.54 tonnes of CO2 to go into the atmosphere - nearly three times what Carbonneutral estimates - for my NYC trip. I should pay £11.55 to offset, with the money going to energy efficiency, renewables and tree-planting projects.

So, four wildly different choices for a journey that's 6880 miles round. In the end, I plumped for Climatecare partly because of the big names endorsing it, but also because it uses an airport calculator and is asking for more cash than Carbonneutral. Plus I donated £20 to Friends of the Earth for good measure.

Obviously, the greenest option is to not fly at all, but sometimes - for work, say - you're going to board a plane.  In the meantime, airlines could do much more reduce their emissions, as Virgin recently pushed for.

Comments

[Simon M]

Offsetting is greewash.

1. Planting new trees does not "offset" polluting the atmosphere with emissions. Planting more and more trees does not reduce emissions. And if anything, can increase them.

2. Many offset operations don't even plant trees - they simply register your name against trees which were due to be planted anyway.

3. Managed monoculture forests are actually incredibly bad for biodiversity etc.

Sorry, there's no way of salving your conscience. Fly and live with it, or don't fly and feel smug.

Si M

[Paul T]

In response to the comment made on The Green Guys offsetting experience, have you actually ever had a look at any of the websites mentioned?
Personally, I think its lazy to say offsetting is Greenwash or even Greewash for that matter!
Climate Care for example invest in numerous global projects that do not involve reforestation, though that is one area they are involved in (20% to be exact).
"We believe that planting trees cannot be seen as a solution to climate change when taken in isolation." - Climate care site

The remainder of donations go towards investing in renewable energy projects and energy effeciency projects across the globe. These projects are also monitored by a third party to ensure that the expected emissions reductions are being met. There is plenty more information on the site including a break down of their projects and an annual report giving an overview of the 2005 activities.

Unfortunately the issue of climate change is not so black and white as fly or dont fly and any effort that is done to tackle the problem should be applauded and supported rather than dismissed without research.

Whilst I agree we should all reduce our use of air travel to an absolute neccessity, I applaude the green guy for his support of Climate Care and for bringing these sites to peoples attention.

Paul T

[Adam Vaughan]

Hmmm, perhaps I should have made the title for this post clearer: something like 'how to be a bit greener if you have to fly for work'. Some jobs envitably involve flying - mine included, occasionally - so I think it's important to go some way to 'offset' those flights. I've heard the arguments against tree-planting before, and clearly - much like Climate Care says - trees aren't the answer alone.

[orangeacid]

Some great ideas you have on this site :-D I suddenly feel really motivated to be a little more 'green'...

I took the photo at the top of this post, btw, and a friend told me about it. Thanks, I feel great that someone actually wants to use my photos - especially for a good cause :-)

[Ru Hartwell]

Not all offset companies are the same. At Treeflights.com we've tried really hard to address the issues raised by simon m (first comment)
1. 1/4 of the live weight of any tree is comprised of fixed atmospheric carbon.Fact.
2.We demonstrate clear additionality in our planting. None of these trees would be planted without this project.
3.We plant a mixture of 12 species to encourage biodiversity.
4.Its not about salving anyones concsience. Its about ordinary people taking small substantive steps to improve our atmosphere over the very long term.