My position has always been that carbon offsets aren’t perfect, but they are better than nothing. Apparently they are even less helpful than I thought. There’s really no good way to offset extreme travel, especially plane travel. The only real choice is to go flight free, or at least pledge to stop flying for the duration of the climate crisis. However long that may be.
Yes, I know it’s an imperfect world. Some of you cannot or will not stop flying. Just like I can’t invent a time machine and retroactively on take the flights I took for the decades of my life before I stepped-up my eco/social activism.
I’m just updating the information I have been putting out there.
I trust the word that I’m hearing right now that carbon offsets really don’t help.
“We Wish Buying Carbon Offsets for Your Flight Helped. It Doesn’t.” https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/buying-carbon-offsets-for-your-flight-doesnt-help/; New York Times Wirecutter, February 22, 2023.
And in this blog, I have been sharing with you some possibly enticing ways to wean yourself off of needing long-distance travel. There are many, many benefits. To yourself and to your community, not just to the global environment. I mean, it’s all connected of course, but you know what I mean.