What is Carbon Neutral?
By Chris Tilley
A bunch of trucks not running their engines and still having air conditioning, tv, electricity and phone. (source IdlelAire)
I was asked the question ‘What does it mean to be carbon neutral?’ This question came from the fact that the Run for One Planet tour is carbon neutral. This comes down to three terms that we need to explain: carbon footprint, carbon credit and carbon neutral.
What is a carbon footprint?
When we drive our cars, use electricity and many other of our daily activities involve the emitting carbon dioxide (CO2). The biggest emissions come from our homes second is our cars. I keep track of my mileage and my emissions. In an average month I use about 70 litres or 18 gallons of gas and that causes just over 400 lbs of carbon dioxide to be emitted. On an annual bases that works out 2.1 tonnes of CO2. I drive a small car and less than average. The average for a small car is 3 tonnes but you can vary that greatly with your driving habits. There are many carbon footprint calculators out there some based on averages and other based on a more detailed look at how you run your life.
- Eco neutral
- Climate Crisis (Al Gore)
What is a carbon credit?
Carbon credits are a way of offsetting the carbon that you have caused by driving your car, heating your home and all those other things we do that cause emissions. Carbon credits either work by taking carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere usually by planting trees or by reducing the carbon emissions of others. CarbonFund has a project where a company called Idleaire provides electrical, air conditioning/heat, tv, and internet to long haul truckers through a window insert so they don’t have to run their engines in their down time in order to have electricity.(source) They have another with the City of Portland to optimized traffic lights on their major arteries reducing idling at traffic lights.(source) Its interesting to read what their projects are. Here is a list of Carbon Credit companies and it list who certifies them.
What is carbon neutral?
To be carbon neutral means to have no carbon emissions through a combination of reducing you carbon footprint and buying carbon credits. To qutoe Al Gore “reduce what you can, offset the rest”
You have nicely explained what does mean by carbon neutral.
Comment by global warming — Thursday, March 5, 2009 @ 5:51 am