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Revealed: top carbon offset projects may not cut planet-heating emissions
(www.theguardian.com)
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this post was submitted on 19 Sep 2023
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And yet, in the US our politicians will still tout carbon offsets or carbon credits as if they are a solution to anything. The PR realizes that carbon-credits or carbon-offsets are bullshit the public has started to pickup on, so now they use "carbon capture" or "net-zero carbon." But make no mistakes, there isn't an environmental party that exists in the US, or anywhere else for that matter.
https://www.energy.gov/articles/biden-harris-administration-announces-25-billion-cut-pollution-and-deliver-economic
"President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act features substantial improvements to the federal Section 45Q tax credit for the capture and geologic storage of CO2, which provides additional incentives to help enable wide-scale project deployment."
These are subsidies to the Energy Sector btw.
Carbon credits aren't necessarily a bad idea. It basically sets a hard limit for the amount of carbon that can be produced, and the ability to produce can be sold. Now, the way it should be handled is every person is provided with a certain amount of credit, and they can sell them and make money off of them, bargain with them, or just choose not to give them up reducing the amount of carbon that is allowed to be produced. It should be up to the people.
Some amount of carbon will always be released. It should be handled in the way that best benefits the people, not the capitalists. Carbon credits may be part of that solution, but not in the form they usually take.
Also the argument we should be having in the US is whether we reach our climate goals through this kind of carbon-pricing model or the top-down regulatory model. In a sane world we'd probably expect republicans to be arguing for a carbon trading scheme and the democrats to be arguing for regulation.