Why You Should Offset 🫡

The pitch for offsetting your emissions.

by Greenwashed

Why You Should Offset 🫡
Photo by Luca Bravo / Unsplash

Share

Carbon offsets are a bit of a controversial topic.

Many, including Last Week Tonight host John Oliver, have rightly criticized the offset industry for its lack of transparency and issues surrounding the accuracy of climate impact.

While these (solvable!) issues are real and very serious, painting the entire concept of carbon offsets as a greenwashing scam is a) wrong and b) antithetical to our species’ dire need to slow the progress of the climate crisis.

Outlined below is the correct way to view carbon offsets and an action plan to help the planet by using them. ⬇️

Old Thinking vs. New Thinking πŸ’‘

In the past, it was believed that offsetting emissions should be the last resort for any climate action plan, since the climate crisis will only be fully solved by an end-to-end replacement of unsustainable activities and not simply offsetting them.

This is true, but it fails to account for the most important variable in the equation for solving the climate crisis: time. ⏳

A transition to sustainable systems is entirely possible, and we’ve been making good progress. There was a recent breakthrough in nuclear fusion, solar is getting cheaper, we’re finding ways to destroy β€œforever chemicals”, and so much more.

However, all of the advancements will take time to perfect, more time to implement, and even more time to convince all of the people that fall victim to fossil-fuel-funded climate disinformation that we should implement them. It’s imperative to remember that while we’re working on that, our planet is still burning.

β›ˆοΈ
Instead of waiting around for our scientists to solve energy or for our politicians to solve corruption (πŸ™„), we need to take action now to slow the negative effects of the climate crisis before the problems become insurmountable.

It may be overblown, but offsets do have a tangible positive impact. 🌍

One day, we’ll live in a fully sustainable world. In the meantime, however, we must not let the problem get any worse. Slowing the impact of the climate crisis is the best we can do while we work towards building a green future, and offsets are far and away the best way to do that.

Offset everything, always, now. And then we can wait around and see what solutions our brightest minds can cook up to transition us into a world where offsets are no longer necessary.

Action Plan πŸƒβ€β™‚οΈ

Carbon offsets, due to the aforementioned legitimate criticism of the old offset market being opaque, used to only be available to huge institutions looking for large numbers of offsets and willing to pay massive brokerage fees to obtain them.

That wasn’t going to work for us.

The team behind Greenwashed got tired of just writing about climate issues without ever offering a way to do anything about them, so we built a tool for people to get around the opacity of the offset market and actually take tangible climate action.

Using open technologies to verify offset quality and ensure projects receive their funding, our tool, Carbonisbad, allows people to negate their carbon footprint with high-quality carbon offsets with just a few clicks. How?

  1. Enter your lifestyle habits here πŸ‘ˆ
  2. Choose your preferred offset batch πŸ˜ƒ
  3. Subscribe via any credit/debit card πŸͺͺ
Dashboard of my favorite reader, who is definitely a real person and not an account I made to get this image

Offsets are controversial for a reason. There are gaps in verification, loopholes to acquire more offsets than you deserve, outdated market dynamics that prevent the market from scaling, and the plain fact that they aren’t the final solution to the climate crisis.

However, they are far and away the best tool we have right now to slow negative climate impact and give our best minds time to create a sustainable future. We’re working every day to make sure this future becomes a reality.

We’d love for you to join us. πŸ’š