Thomas Friedman on carbon offsets

While I'm in Canada I'm catching up with posts that should have gone out last week. I'm able to perform these menial tasks even after consuming huge amounts of Alberta beef. Speaking of beef ...

There is no such thing as a free lunch (Live Bad, Go Green):

... I raise this issue of carbon offsets because they’re symptomatic of the larger problem we face in confronting climate change: everyone wants it to happen, but without pain or sacrifice. On balance, I think carbon-offsetting is a good thing — my family has purchased offsets — if for no other reason than it directs resources toward clean technologies that might not have been funded and, therefore, moves us down the innovation curve faster.

But the danger, argues Michael Sandel, Harvard’s noted political philosopher, “is that carbon offsets will become, at least for some, a painless mechanism to buy our way out of the more fundamental changes in habits, attitudes and way of life that are actually required to address the climate problem.”

“If someone drives a Hummer and buys carbon offsets to salve his conscience, that is better than driving the Hummer and doing nothing,” added Mr. Sandel, author of “The Case Against Perfection: Ethics in the Age of Genetic Engineering.” “But it would be even better to trade in the Hummer for a hybrid. The risk is that carbon offsets will make Hummers seem respectable rather than irresponsible, and distract us, as a nation, from harder, bigger changes in our energy policy.”

People often refer to the current climate buzz as “a green revolution,” but the very term revolution suggests a fundamental break with past habits, attitudes and public policies. Yet, when you suggest a carbon tax or a higher gasoline tax — initiatives that would redirect resources and change habits at the scale actually needed to impact global warming — what is the first thing you hear in Congress? “Impossible — you can’t use the T-word.”

A revolution without sacrifice where everyone is a winner? There’s no such thing.

Comments

[Ben]

Non economists make this stupid argument all the time. There's been a lot of dismissive talk calling them "carbon indulgences."

For an economist, offsets are an obviously good thing.

For me, the best answer to a philosopher is to cite Kant's categorical imperative. Would the world be a better place if everyone did it. And the answer is unequivocally yes. If the hummer buyer purchaed offsets to full offset the hummer. And everyone did it, then net carbon would be zero. If he bought the hummer anyway, then good for him.

[Ben]

Forgot to add, the key fallacy in his logic is here:

“But it would be even better to trade in the Hummer for a hybrid.

That's clearly not true. There is a social cost of using the Hummer over the hybrid. If you value the Hummer more than the social cost, then trading to a hybrid is bad for society.

[odograph]

FWIW, offset, and "indulgences" argument have raged over at gristmill. Actually the arguments rage beyond that just one, but after that one I got pretty bored.

I pretty much took the chemist's view, that if you can total the CO2 emitted or sequestered, you can define rational offsets.

[greg claxton]

And [if] everyone did it, then net carbon would be zero.

I think this is not true, or at least not true beyond a simple hypothetical. Most offsets work by substituting non-carbon-emitting energy generation for carbon-emitting energy generation (wind turbines for coal plants), with the idea that even though the person buying the offset isn't using that energy, someone else is. However, not everyone can do that.

Imagine you have two people. At the start, they're both emitting CO2. Person 1 buys an offset, which allows the other person to stop emitting CO2. Person 2 can't do that anymore. The only thing Person 2 could do would be to pay Person 1 to stop doing whatever activity he/she was offsetting, but the whole point of the offset is to let Person 1 keep on keepin' on.

This is different if there's a good mechanism for actually taking CO2 (and everything else) out of the air. But there isn't--tree planting is by far the sketchiest part of offsets accounting. We're still understanding the process--e.g., the fact that tree planting in the further parts of each hemisphere may actually be a net contributor to CO2 emissions.

That said, I think offsets are a good short-range solution. I think most people make CO2 improvements in levels, and they're good for helping people reduce in between moving from one level to the next.