Originally Posted by
cbn42
No, I don't buy offsets. I think the idea of offsets is a great one, but I have no way of knowing if the money is being used for its intended purpose, how they are measuring the amount of the offset, or whether the project they invest in would have received funding otherwise. I also don't want to normalize the idea of pollution prevention to be voluntary.
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I have the same thoughts.
This was an interesting story from ProPublica that certainly didn’t give credibility to it, and suggested it can do more harm than good. I agree that pollution prevention shouldn’t be voluntary and that there are other things we can do as individuals that we can be assured are more impactful. I’m vegan for many reasons, but at the top is deforestation and land/water usage for livestock.
From ProPublica:
“In case after case, I found that carbon credits hadn’t offset the amount of pollution they were supposed to, or they had brought gains that were quickly reversed or that couldn’t be accurately measured to begin with. Ultimately, the polluters got a guilt-free pass to keep emitting CO₂, but the forest preservation that was supposed to balance the ledger either never came or didn’t last.”
https://features.propublica.org/braz...acre-cambodia/