I liked the idea of carbon offsets until I tried to explain it
Avoided emissions are a scam.<p>&quot;Nature based&quot; offsets aren&#x27;t that much better.  It is mainly &quot;pay us or we&#x27;ll cut down this forest&quot; but there is a fundamental timing problem:  you emitted one ton of CO2 yesterday,  somebody else has to protect a forest forever to keep that CO2 trapped.<p>There are other schemes that claim to be low cost such as<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.vesta.earth&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.vesta.earth&#x2F;</a><p>that have the problem of not being measurable.  Contrast that to other schemes that get 1% of the press coverage,  such as the &quot;gold standard&quot; of injecting CO2 into saline aquifers<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sciencedirect.com&#x2F;science&#x2F;article&#x2F;abs&#x2F;pii&#x2F;S1750583615000146" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sciencedirect.com&#x2F;science&#x2F;article&#x2F;abs&#x2F;pii&#x2F;S17505...</a><p>where you really can measure the gas going into the hole and can almost (but not quite) take it for granted that the CO2 will stay there for 10,000 years.