Offset Your Emissions: High Atlas Carbon Solution

The webinar “Defusing Carbon Bombs in the MENA Region” took place on June 6, 2023. It was part of the webinar series “Towards Defusing Global Carbon Bombs”, which was organized in collaboration between the Climate Action Network International (CAN-I), the Leave It In The Ground Initiative (LINGO) and regional partners.

This session covered the importance of identifying and defusing carbon bombs in the MENA region to reverse climate change, protect the environment and to improve the living situation of the local population. 

The climate emergency needs a new response from global society: defusing carbon bombs, the biggest fossil fuel projects in the world, which emit more than 1 Gigaton (1 billion tons) of CO2 over their lifetime. LINGO, Global Energy Monitor and Urgewald have published a global list of over 400 projects (half coal, half oil & gas) and their analysis shows that the CO2 emissions of these projects would take us way beyond the 1.5°C goal. We need to pay more attention to them and develop strategies to prevent the implementation and the disastrous consequences of these projects.

On an important sidenote: The High Atlas Foundation is grateful to have partnered with LINGO, Germanwatch, GreenFaith, Ummah for Earth, the The Faculty of Islamic Law at University Sidi Mohammed Ben Abdellah on the International Conference on Islam and Climate Emergency in Fes that took place this past February. Our shared public statement reflects the common understanding reached by the Islamic and climate scholars over the course of the three days.

Kjell, the director of LINGO, started the session by presenting the current situation regarding carbon bombs in the whole world. Currently, there are 425 projects considered carbon bombs all over the world. However, 40% of these are new projects which means that they are only in the planning or construction phase. This gives initiatives such as LINGO more possibilities to fight these projects to prevent their implementation and protect the climate and environment.

Right now, there are on average 421 parts of CO2 per 1 million particles (ppm) in the atmosphere. In order to reach the 1.5° C target the concentration needs to be below 350 ppm.

If no new carbon bomb projects were to be added to the current ones, we would have a 50% chance of actually reaching the 1.5°C target set by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Otherwise, staying below 1.5°C of global warming is virtually impossible. Kühne´s research on this topic was also featured in a Guardian article about carbon bombs.

To defuse these carbon bombs LINGO has developed a three-step approach: Identify, Understand and Defuse.

The International Energy Agency has stated that there is no need for the construction of new fossil fuel projects. Instead, current projects should be put into harvest mode where they are kept running until the end without additional expansion to bridge the transition phase to a carbon neutral society in the future. Alternatively, projects such as coal mines with a particularly bad impact on the environment should be shut down early to mitigate potential damages.

Big projects take lots of time and there are many players involved, which offers many potential points of intervention to stop them. To achieve that, a global, climate-friendly, bottom-up approach is needed.

Considering that the emission of 1 Gigaton of CO2 amounts to approximately 225,000 deaths and $418 billion in damages, millions of lives and trillions of dollars could be saved this way. One of the possible intervention points is researching the supply chains, identifying important project partners in areas such as insurance, finance, logistics, sales, refining, etc. and publishing information about their involvement to force these companies to submit to public pressure and pull out of these projects.

Another way to stop these projects is using litigation to force courts and governments to investigate the projects and punish companies for breaking laws as well as creating publicity for these issues. It is also important to reverse the reframing of harmful energy sources by the fossil fuel industry to green and sustainable alternatives.

For example the renaming of fossil gas to natural gas has led the population to believe that it is environment-friendly. In reality however, it is methane, a greenhouse gas with a big short-term impact. Decreasing the use of methane would have an immediate, positive impact on health and the environment across the world.

Next, Kate  from Crude Accountability talked about the carbon bomb situation in Azerbaijan. The Azeri Chirag Guneshli oil field with its 141 wells in the Caspian Sea has had a massive impact on the local environment and communities. Especially the flaring of methane, which is extracted from the ground as a byproduct of oil drilling, is very harmful. Crude Accountability talked with community members of the region and they found that many kids had epilepsy and that the emissions caused various brain disorders. Toxic rain in the region together with destroyed and contaminated soils also makes growing crops almost impossible. On top of that many fish have died, meaning that local fishermen have lost their livelihood because of oil drilling.

However, after being presented with these facts, BP, the operator of the site, said that they have conducted independent studies and that it is the waste of the local population and not BP´s emissions that are the cause for these problems.

Currently, BP and the Azerbaijani government are even planning to expand the field. Only a small amount of the extracted oil and gas actually stays in Azerbaijan. Most of it is exported to western countries, meaning that most of the pollution in the region could be prevented if western countries stopped importing oil and gas from there. In addition to pushing for an import stop, BP and international financial institutions that are supporting this project must be held accountable and put under pressure by the public and by legislators to stop these practices.

Julien, program director at Greenpeace MENA, talked about the FSO Safer, an almost 50-year old floating oil storage and offloading vessel, which is moored about nine kilometers off Yemen’s Ras Issa peninsula, where it has been since 1988. FSO Safer has not been maintained since 2015 because of the conflict in Yemen, and it has decayed to the point where there is an imminent risk it could explode or break apart, which would have disastrous effects on the region. The ship is estimated to contain about 1.14 million barrels of oil valued at up to $80 million.

A potential oil spill from FSO Safer would devastate local fishing communities, risking 200,000 livelihoods as toxic pollutants would be released into the water and the air. The spill would also close nearby ports, which are crucial for food and supplies to 17 million people. It could reach the African coast, harming coral reefs and marine life. Experts estimate that the recovery of fish stocks would take 25 years and have devastating impacts on the economy and food security in the region. Cleanup costs of $20 billion and disruptions to global trade through the Bab al-Mandab strait would further add to the impact.

Greenpeace and the UN have been campaigning for a rescue mission since 2020, but only now have they raised the necessary funds to begin with the first phase, which costs $100 million. Interestingly, international oil companies such as Total and ExxonMobil were using the tanker to store oil and actually own part of the oil stored on the vessel, but they were not ready to contribute money to the rescue mission.

This kind of negligent and reckless behavior must be exposed and the irresponsible and the damaging business models of the fossil fuel industry restricted.

Ahmed from CAN-I in Egypt is a marine biologist who works on the conservation of the Red Sea as well as the phasing out of fossil fuels as part of the energy transition. In this webinar he talked about the role and actions of fossil fuel companies in the global south.

Unlike many countries from the global north, many developing countries have not yet established working energy infrastructure and universal energy access for their population. While this creates additional challenges and need for bigger investments in addition to the energy transition, this also creates opportunities for these countries to skip fossil fuels and focus on green energies straightaway. While this is more costly and might take longer, the population of these countries would gain a lot of long-term rewards from this strategy.

However, many oil companies approach these governments and offer to pay for the infrastructure to give the people energy access in exchange for getting the right to drill for oil and gas. As an alternative, countries should promote an equitable phase out of oil and gas. However, this sounds easier than it is as many countries, especially in the global south, heavily rely on fossil fuel exports for their budget. These countries require international, financial and technical support for this transition, but they also must be ready to rethink and change their economy to meet the new demands of the future. The goal of this energy transition has to be to create a safe environment for people to live in all across the world.

Ermioni from the Gastivists in Greece presented the current situation in the Eastern Mediterranean and what actions NGOs and activists are taking to improve it. The region is one of the areas with the largest biodiversity in the world. Recently, governments have been pushing fossil fuel extraction and the construction of pipelines. The region is already suffering from extreme climate events such as droughts and floods, which lead to crop losses and food shortages. Fossil fuels and possible pipeline leaks in the sea would not only exacerbate these issues, but also heavily impact tourism and the fishing industry, which are important pillars of the economy for many of these countries.

Oil and gas projects are often sold to the population as something patriotic that would increase the power and influence of the country in the region, when in actuality it is harming the people and the environment. While there are grassroots movements, they are still very new and only developing slowly as they are trying to build trust with affected communities. The climate change movement in the region is small and very euro-centric, which makes it important to put a bigger emphasis on region-specific challenges and issues in the work of the NGOs. One of the main projects of Gastivists is the prevention of the expansion of gas by working against the construction of new LNG terminals in Greece.

Jessica from the BBC, who is the director of the award-winning documentary “Under Poisoned Skies” talked about her movie, which is about the gas flaring in Southern Iraq and the harmful impacts it has on the people living there. Nowhere else in the world is gas flaring happening this close to the homes of people (as close as 250 meters). During the day big, black clouds of smoke cover the sky, while at night the sky is lit by burning gas. When Jessica came there, the flaring was happening 24 hours a day and the people said cancer was as common as the flu. Together with a team of doctors and scientists she put into place pollution monitoring and as expected the concentration of carcinogens in the air, water, soil and the bodies of the people was way above the risk-free level.

The oil companies, however, do not care as there are no regulations in these countries and they get paid more money if they do not implement safety measures. If they captured the methane instead of burning it, they could prevent a lot of CO2 emissions (gas flaring produces globally more CO2 emissions than the UK) and protect the local population and environment, but they would lose some money because they would have to decrease their oil extraction rate. Even though oil companies made their highest ever profits from Iraqi oil fields last year, companies are not ready to take this small cut in their earnings. These oil companies such as BP, who is the lead operator of the site, also do not report their emissions from flaring by using a loophole, which allows them to not disclose emissions from sites where they are not the sole operator.

The movie has however had an impact. The Iraqi government has moved its target for zero gas flaring forward to 2025 and the UK pension investment fund, which is a big shareholder of BP, voted against reinstating BP´s chairman after the documentary exposed BP´s bad practices.

The main character of the movie, Ali, was supposed to speak at BP´s shareholders meeting on April 27, but sadly he died of leukemia six days before the meeting. He was only in his twenties when he passed away. His tragic death is just one example of how the harmful methods of the fossil fuel industry destroy human lives and that it is imperative to act now to stop them.

Ali´s family is still living in the same place and children continue to be exposed to the dangerous flaring emissions and the systemic human rights infringements. It is time to hold oil companies accountable and change this. Especially people from regions such as the Middle East and Northern Africa, which are already heavily affected by climate change and the bad practices of oil companies, need to raise their voice because if the current trend continues, these regions might become uninhabitable in the years to come.

The webinar “Defusing Carbon Bombs in Africa” was part of the webinar series “Towards Defusing Global Carbon Bombs”, which was organized in collaboration between the Climate Action Network International (CAN), the Leave It In The Ground Initiative (LINGO) and regional partners, and it took place on April 18, 2023.

This session covered the importance of identifying and defusing carbon bombs on the African continent to reverse climate change, protect the environment and to improve the living situation of the local population.

The climate emergency needs a new response from global society: defusing carbon bombs, the biggest fossil fuel projects in the world, which emit more than 1 Gigaton (1 billion tons) of CO2 over their lifetime. LINGO, Global Energy Monitor and Urgewald have published a global list of over 400 projects (half coal, half oil & gas) and the analysis shows that the CO2 emissions of these projects would take us way beyond the 1.5°C goal.  We need to pay more attention to them and develop strategies to prevent the implementation and the disastrous consequences of these projects.

Kjell, the director of LINGO, started the session by presenting the current situation regarding carbon bombs in the whole world and then in Africa specifically.

On an important sidenote: The High Atlas Foundation is very grateful to have partnered with LINGO, Germanwatch, GreenFaith, Ummah for Earth, the The Faculty of Islamic Law at University Sidi Mohammed Ben Abdellah on the International Conference on Islam and Climate Emergency in Fes that took place this past February. Our shared public statement reflects the common understanding reached by the Islamic and climate scholars over the course of the three days.  

There are 425 projects considered carbon bombs all over the world. However, 40% of these are new projects which means that they are only in the planning or construction phase.

This gives initiatives such as LINGO more possibilities to fight these projects to prevent their implementation and protect the climate and environment.

If no new carbon bomb projects were to be added to the current ones, we would have a 50% chance of actually reaching the 1.5°C target set by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Otherwise, staying below 1.5°C of global warming is virtually impossible.

Kühne´s research on this topic was featured in a Guardian article about carbon bombs. There he exposed world leaders who, shortly after backing more climate action at the Climate Summit in Glasgow, enabled huge new oil, gas and coal projects, which will continue to drive up global warming and environmental pollution all over the world.

To defuse these carbon bombs LINGO has developed a three-step approach: Identify, Understand and Defuse.

The International Energy Agency has stated that there is no need for the construction of new fossil fuel projects. Instead, current projects should be put into harvest mode where they are kept running until the end without additional expansion to bridge the transition phase to a carbon neutral society in the future. Alternatively, projects such as coal mines with a particularly bad impact on the environment should be shut down early to mitigate potential damages.

Big projects take lots of time and there are many players involved, which offers many potential points of intervention to stop them. To achieve that, a global, climate-friendly, bottom-up approach is needed.

Considering that the emission of 1 Gigaton of CO2 amounts to approximately 225,000 deaths and $418 billion in damages, millions of lives and trillions of dollars could be saved this way. One of the possible intervention points is researching the supply chains, identifying important project partners in areas such as insurance, finance, logistics, sales, refining, etc. and publishing information about their involvement to force these companies to submit to public pressure and pull out of these projects.

Another way to stop these projects is using litigation to force courts and governments to investigate the projects and punish companies for breaking laws as well as creating publicity for these issues. It is also important to reverse the reframing of harmful energy sources by the fossil fuel industry to green and sustainable alternatives.

For example the renaming of fossil gas to natural gas has led the population to believe that it is environment-friendly. In reality however, it is methane, a greenhouse gas with a big short-term impact. Decreasing the use of methane would have immediate impacts such as saving lives and protecting the environment.

Samuel Okulony from the Environment Governance Institute Uganda and StopEACOP held a presentation about the importance of stopping the construction of the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) through Uganda and Tanzania, a carbon bomb in the midst of Africa.

TotalEnergies, The Uganda National Oil Company, the Tanzania Petroleum Development Corporation and CNOOC Limited are the shareholders of the pipeline, which will be electrically heated to above 50°C and has a peak capacity of 246,000 barrels of crude oil. It will be 1,443 km long, of which 470 km will run through the Lake Victoria Basin.

Lake Victoria is crucial for the region as it directly supports the livelihoods of more than 40 million people in the region.

Over a period of 25 years, the project will generate over 379 million tonnes of CO2 emissions, which would exceed France's national emissions in 2020, which amounted to 277 million tons of CO2. The implementation of EACOP will seriously worsen the severity of the global climate emergency.

Over 13,292 households or over 86,000 people in Uganda and Tanzania are affected by the project. Many of them had to move houses and 3,500 households were displaced economically. Nearly 2,000 sq. km of protected wildlife habitats are affected by the pipeline construction, which threatens vulnerable species such as chimpanzees or elephants as being able to traverse through these reserves is critical for their survival.

Mitigating climate change will require united efforts from people, governments and companies from all around the world. Because of that the construction of a massive crude oil pipeline amidst a climate emergency goes against any rational judgment. Should the involved companies refuse to listen to the scientific evidence opposing the project, the StopEACOP Initiative proposes approaching banks and insurance companies to prevent the financing and insuring of EACOP and putting an end to the project this way.

Joseph from Malawi works with LINGO and is part of the early stage resistance against oil exploration in Lake Malawi. He works together with communities to build awareness and to create a dialogue with the government to stop the oil project which would cover the entire lake area. He is working on establishing a community of people who collaborate to resist the project and to ensure that people's lives and their livelihoods as well as nature are protected and prioritized over financial profits. The lake has a large variety of fish species, some which were only recently discovered, and it is the economic basis for many rural communities, which are already feeling severe effects of climate change.

A cyclone in March displaced half a million Malawians and destroyed a lot of important infrastructure and buildings. The educational sector was also heavily affected by the catastrophe and many of the schools still have not opened. Joseph was visiting one school which was still struggling with the aftermath of the cyclone during the webinar. One of the teachers told us about the terrible situation there and how they were trying to cope with it to enable students to visit school nonetheless.

As the children have to help at home with repairs during the day, the school has started to hold classes in the late afternoon or in the evening before it gets dark. On top of that they are teaching students mostly outside as the cyclone also heavily damaged buildings.

This shows how climate change affects many different areas and thus how important combatting it is.

Yegeshni Moodley from groundWork from South Africa presented the work she and the organization did regarding fossil fuel projects. At the moment there is one existing carbon bomb in South Africa and there are six more which are in planning. Most of them are coal mines and oil and gas projects.

An important part of Yegeshni´s work is empowering communities to make meaningful contributions to protecting the environment. She works together with communities to listen to their problems and opinions and looks for ways together with them how these can be solved. She is an advocate for social justice and youth development in South Africa.

On top of that she is a member of the Life After Coal Campaign which discourages the development of fossil fuel projects in South Africa. An important achievement in the fight against fossil fuel projects was the first climate impact study for a new project in 2018, which became the benchmark for future projects.

Right now they are preparing a constitution case about fossil fuel projects and how they threaten future generations of South Africans. By doing this as well as advocating for the development of renewable energies and the restoration of damages created by fossil fuel projects and looking for ways in which energy efficiency can be improved, the campaign hopes to bring South Africa on the right track to overcome the problems and challenges that fossil fuels and climate change pose for a healthy environment and population.

Ken from the NGO, We the People, in Nigeria talked about the natural gas projects in the Niger Delta and their horrible consequences for the local population and environment. Currently, oil and gas from the Niger Delta goes to Europe and countries in West Africa up to Morocco.

The environmental consequences of oil and gas extraction in the delta are disastrous: farming lands are contaminated by regular oil spills, people are being kicked out of their homes by oil companies who drill for oil on their lands, many people suffer from diseases and health issues, which have been scientifically linked to the extraction of fossil fuels, and the air is polluted because of the flaring of methane, which was originally outlawed in 1979, but law enforcement is still non-existent over 40 years later.

Revenues from crude oil and gas extraction make up 90% of the country's income.

However, barely anything of it goes back to the local population. Most Nigerians are still very poor and live under bad conditions which result in a very low average life expectancy of 53 years. However, in the Niger Delta, where all of the oil and gas extraction takes place, the life expectancy is even more than ten years lower with only 41 years.

We The People demands the stop of oil and gas extraction in the Niger Delta as well as the stop of the establishment of new coal mines in the area. Ilham Rawoot from JA! in Mozambique talked about her work with communities affected by extraction companies in Mozambique. A natural gas project in Mozambique which was backed by Total, Eni, Exxon, HSBC and many governments has led to mass displacements, the death of 4,000 civilians and the militarization of the project area. Following the ongoing insurgency in Cabo Delgado, in the north of the country where the project is located, Total paused the project.

JA! is now working on stopping the project completely before Total returns to construction. They do that by mobilizing communities, writing letters to involved governments and confronting shareholders at shareholder meetings.

Kwami from the Center for Climate & Environmental Justice Centre in Togo talked about efforts to prevent potential extraction of fossil fuels. Following the initial discovery of oil and gas in the country in 2011, companies started planning off-shore extraction projects.

Kwami is mobilizing communities against these plans. Many communities in Togo feel the effects of climate change as their houses are destroyed because of the rise of sea water levels. Additionally, fishery has decreased significantly because a lot of the fish stay close to the pipelines in the ocean but fishers are not allowed to go near them.

Africa is heavily impacted by the climate crisis and continuing the extraction of fossil fuels will only make this worse. Combatting drivers of climate change such as the extraction of fossil fuels is crucial for reversing climate change. Instead of just fighting the symptoms, the problem has to be addressed at the root.

Unfortunately, many of the African leaders are corrupt and still believe in false solutions such as carbon sequestration or offsets, which benefit the finance sector and oil companies, but not the people. The leaders do not want to learn from their past mistakes and they actively decide to continue their irresponsible way of promoting fossil fuel extraction.

Making people understand that leaving oil and gas in the ground is beneficial for them is imperative as this is the only possible way to prevent the continuous extraction of oil and gas and to achieve the reversal of climate change.

Dear friend,

I'm truly excited to be hosting a virtual presentation and Q&A session about HAF's Carbon Offsets program on Wednesday, March 22 at 2:00 PM Morocco / 10:00 AM New York.

Our model is uniquely social, involving the growing and monitoring of fruit trees that represent increased and long-term earning potential for the rural Moroccan farming families with whom we plant each year.

If you are exploring ways to improve the quality of life for our planet and its people, I sincerely encourage you to join me for this session and to share your questions in advance via the registration form.

All the best,

Yossef Ben-Meir, Ph.D.
President, High Atlas Foundation

Links:

• Registration Link: Carbon Offsets Q&A Wed 3/22/23
• Carbon Offsets Brochure (English)
• Carbon Offsets Brochure (French)

Morocco’s Need for Trees

According to Morocco’s Ministry of Agriculture, one billion fruit trees and billions of medicinal plants are needed as one of several essential contributions in order to overcome poverty in rural areas, which afflicts approximately 80 percent of its people. In addition, drylands cover 97 percent of Moroccan land, being one of the world's best long-term carbon sinks it requires immediate action to halt irreversible degradation of soils.

Obstacle to Transition

Farming families in Morocco are economically compelled to transition toward fruit tree agriculture and away from traditionally growing barley and corn. These staple crops are currently cultivated on 70 percent of agricultural land, yet only generate 10 to 15 percent of agricultural revenue. To address this obstacle to sustainable livelihoods, rural communities must build nurseries to grow from seeds the fruit trees and medicinal plants they need to cultivate in their localities. However, farming households cannot dedicate their land to build nurseries because their survival requires sowing and harvesting every year. Therefore, the in-kind contribution of land for people’s nurseries is vital to meet the demand for trees of rural families.

Partners for Land In-Kind

The High Atlas Foundation (HAF) receives land lent in-kind for the nurseries of farming communities from government agencies, universities, and civil groups, including the High Commission of Waters and Forests, the Ministry of Culture, Youth, and Sports, the Ministry of Education and Professional Development, University Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah in Fes, Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane, the Moroccan Jewish community, and cooperatives.

HAF Nurseries: Millions of Trees

Currently the High Atlas Foundation manages twelve tree nurseries in seven provinces of Morocco. At maximum capacity, they can currently grow 1.6 million organic fruit saplings grown from native seeds. In addition to these twelve locations of community-managed nurseries, the High Atlas Foundation has also been lent land without cost from the above agencies to build 13 new nurseries of relatively large size, that if planted to their capacities, includes the generation of approximately 10 million trees per year.

Carbon Sequestration

Based on HAF calculations in consultation with carbon offset experts, the planting of 10 million fruit trees will generate approximately 425,000 verified carbon units (VCUs). To secure these units, monetize their value, and account for their CO2 offset benefit, the trees require monitoring twice during the first five years. While VCU’s are usually stored up to 150 years in living trees, due to the unique climatic conditions of Morocco, carbon is transformed into stabilized hummus, remaining in the soil for up to 1,000 years. HAF commits to sustainable long-term carbon storage, providing the wrap-around service of constructing and maintaining the nurseries, transplanting them with farming families, cooperatives, and education centers, while monitoring
and registering the data. Ten million trees impact approximately 40,000 rural households, including 200,000 people, while cooling the climate globally.

Low Cost Offsets

HAF is able to provide tree planting, monitoring, and the required data to secure CO2 offsets at the low cost of $0.55 per tree due to these contributing factors:

1. We grow the saplings from seeds, which allows us to retain significant value, spending only 16 to 25 percent of the private sector price per tree, depending on the variety.

2. The lending of free land by public and civil agencies further reduces costs and price-per-tree unit.

3. The utilization of local fruit seed varieties not only significantly enhances biodiversity, but enables seed procurement in close proximity to the nurseries, reducing transportation costs and increasing survival rates.

4. Nurseries are maintained by local community members who receive from the HAF a fair salary plus benefits, including health insurance and social security, with seasonal workers also coming from the neighboring vicinity. Thus, labor costs are relatively modest with a high level of commitment and satisfaction.

5. Finally, the trees are distributed to the farmers, where capacity building workshops on effective tree planting and care play a key role in maintaining the HAF’s outstanding tree survival rate. Farmers pay $0.20 per tree, and the entirety of that amount is reinvested in seeds in order to replenish the nurseries, provide for their caretaking, and continue the generation of young trees for subsequent years.

Created in the 1980s, carbon offsets refer to the sequestering or removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to subtract from industrial and personal total emissions. Different techniques (of which tree planting is the most popular) are used to produce carbon offset credits, a purchasable equivalent of 1 metric tonne of removed carbon dioxide.

The offset market has recently gained overwhelming global support as social movements drive more industries and governments to address climate change directly. Despite its popularity, there is no strong international government oversight of the carbon offset market, leading to complexities in evaluating the effectiveness of this economic and environmental practice.

More so, lack of regulation allows actors within this market to create misleading offset claims to increase financial benefits that add –rather than decrease– net emissions. As such, the public and private spheres must take rapid steps to specifically characterize the offset market's realistic impact on the current climate emergency.

Carbon offsets are produced through several different methods. However, researchers widely agreed that credits must be created through environmentally friendly actions that would not exist without the new financing. The most popular method of producing carbon offsets is trees, either planting saplings or protecting forests.

Planting trees is a non-localized solution to carbon emissions. This method of carbon sequestering operates on the basis that all greenhouse gasses (GHG) produced enter a global atmosphere, so planting trees anywhere equally impacts the atmosphere.

A single adult tree will sequester about 1 tonne of carbon every 50 years, and the going rate for carbon credit is USD 7. Tree saplings cost as little as 20 cents, leaving a significant profit to support the infrastructure and expansion of green businesses. Often nonprofits use this monetary surplus to provide fruit-bearing or environmentally beneficial trees to underserved communities.

Beyond tree planting initiatives, carbon offsets confer direct economic value to living forests, providing monetary protections for these resources. Regrettably, despite the positive benefits of tree planting, trees cannot sustain a practical solution to GHG emissions short of massive afforestation of the world’s livable land.

The pitfalls of carbon offsets lie in the lack of industry regulations. Carbon offsets are sustained through two markets: compliance and voluntary. Buyers in these markets must purchase credits in compliance with regulations or act with autonomy to buy credits seeking indirect financial benefits. Ideally, carbon offsets should only target emissions that cannot be removed by other routes.

Instead, carbon credits are often used to raise the total emission cap of a corporation. Even with providers of offsets, there is large variability in the standards of credits- cheap credits are often low quality. Several private, global organizations exist with respected standards to certify carbon offset sources.

They, however, have a fee that makes them less accessible to smaller organizations. Even between these major groups, there are disagreements on standards. The biggest criteria is proof that an offset project could not exist without selling the credits. Companies often get around this standard due to a lack of strict regulations.

Private organizations sell carbon offsets from pre-existing and protected forests. As such, many carbon credits do not indicate new GHG removed from the atmosphere. Even within the developing world, carbon offsets are praised for playing positive roles in developing countries by supporting tree planting and forest protection. At the same time, they often serve to reward the carbon emissions of source nations inadvertently.

The low cost of carbon credits also presents barriers to green initiatives. Carbon offsets remain much more affordable than other methods of carbon removal or transitions to green energy sources. However, tree carbon offsets (like trees) are a temporary solution to global emissions.

The sequestered carbon will eventually return to the environment with the tree’s dead resources. Misleading carbon offsets inundate consumer and private markers, giving the public a false impression of reduced emissions as this short-term solution takes precedent in global markets. The global atmosphere suffers as a result.

Carbon offsets are an essential component of combating climate change, yet they are far from a global miracle drug. The policy is responding to the negative lack of regulation within carbon markets, ensuring in the future, only legitimate carbon sequestering projects can operate. Within the coming years, carbon providers can expect to face stricter rules for credit certification and a more wary buying pool.

To address these changes, tree planting organizations should work to ensure their credits meet the guidelines defined by international groups like the Kyoto Protocol Clean Development Mechanism or Gold Standard, which are major players in creating new policies.

They should prepare sustainable business models based on increased costs of carbon offsets and changes in demand as the industry is forced to employ various sustainable practices. Increased regulation will ensure the positive impact of carbon credit tree-based organizations as active warriors against the climate crisis.