WHY CARBON OFFSETTING?

          As a culture, we are becoming more and more aware of the impact that our daily
lives are having on the environment.  The “green house effect” is a global issue that affects all of us and our future generations.

Our “carbon footprint” is a measure of the C02 or greenhouse gas that we as individuals emit into the atmosphere as a consequence of our lifestyle and activities, the result of  which contributes to global warming. Our “carbon footprint”  is determined by many factors, from our transportation and travel choices to the fuels and energy we use to heat our homes.

There are two markets for carbon offsets. In the larger, compliance market, companies, governments, or other entities buy carbon offsets in order to comply with “caps” on the total amount of carbon dioxide they are allowed to emit. In the voluntary market, individuals, companies, and  governments purchase carbon offsets to mitigate their own greenhouse gas emissions from transportation, electricity use, and other sources.

We recycle, reduce and reuse  to decrease the release of green house gases into the atmosphere, but is that enough? Combating global warming broadly addresses two components, decreasing the release of green house gases and sequestering or removing green house gases. It is important to understand that even our best efforts will only reduce the emission of greenhouse gas but we cannot eliminate it altogether.  Hence we need to concentrate on removing greenhouse gasses from the atmosphere. When it comes to removing CO2 there exists but one solution…growing a tree !