Some critics claim carbon offset schemes let polluters off the hook through the purchase of the equivalent of environmental indulgences. Before setting the record straight on what indulgences are and are not, let’s look at carbon offsets.
They are essentially certificates sold to people interested in reducing the environmental impact from their emissions of carbon dioxide, a key greenhouse gas thought to be a major culprit in adverse global climate change. According to Consumer’s Guide to Retail Carbon Offset Providers there were roughly 30 such establishments worldwide as of 2006 including 16 based in the United States. TerraPass is one such U.S. establishment.
According to TerraPass’s website my current driving, flying, and home energy consumption contributes 63,000 pounds, or 28.57 metric tons (metric ton ≈ 2205 pounds) of carbon dioxide gases to the carbon cycle on an annualized basis. Apparently, I could send TerraPass a check for $374.85 to purchase a certificate declaring TerraPass and I had ‘offset’ this amount by contributing to renewable energy credits through voluntary cap and trade organizations like the Chicago Climate Exchange. That’s only about $13.12 per offset metric ton. According to the Consumer’s Guide to Retail Carbon Offset Providers, the price of offsets ranges from a low of $4 per ton through Natsource to a high of $40 at ClimateSAVE. My $13.12 was not a bad price I figured. Thanks, TerraPass.
But should I write the check? I thought no. Does that mean I’m not practicing good stewardship of the Earth or protecting the environment? As in all areas of life we want to know the truth and pursue the good. The truth is that the carbon offset movement at this time is more of a feel-good contribution than a policy that protects the environment. Here’s why.
The Becker-Posner blog posting on carbon offsets points out that the chief weakness of the movement is its voluntary nature. If there were monetary incentives tied to selling emissions permits or fines imposed for exceeding permitted emission levels, as is the case in cap and trade markets, more sizable reductions would occur. According to Posner, if 10 percent of the U.S. population paid carbon offset providers to offset 32 tons of emissions per family, a huge increase over current rates, it would still reduce emissions by only one-quarter of one percent. World hourly emissions are now 16 million tons, and increasing by about 3 percent per year.
Cap and trade policy sets mandatory limits on emissions and utilizes market forces to achieve emission reductions in cost effective ways. Cap and trade policy has been successful in reducing green house gases like sulfur dioxide which causes acid rain in regions characterized by numerous sources of emissions with a wide variation among these sources in the cost of meeting emission levels. The Environmental Protection Agency claims a 34 percent reduction in acid rain –causing emissions between 1994 and 2004, and cites a study that estimates that in 2010, the Acid Rain Program’s annual benefits will be approximately $122 billion (in 2000 dollars), at an annual cost of about $3 billion-a 40-to-1 benefit-to-cost ratio.
Becker argues a cap and trade approach, despite limitations, is a better method of carbon dioxide emissions reduction. Richard Posner (Dec 02, 2007) has called the carbon offset movement the “echo of the ‘cap and trade’ approach to pollution control.”
Catholic social doctrine advocates protection of human life and the environment. In Fides et ratio 98, Pope John Paul II wrote, “Drawing on this organic vision, linked necessarily to Christian holiness and to the practice of the human and supernatural virtues, moral theology will be able to tackle the various problems in its competence, such as peace, social justice, the family, the defense of life and the natural environment, in a more appropriate and effective way.”
The cap and trade policy approach to pollution could be considered one example of a more effective way to protect and preserve our environment. Direct taxation might be another.
On the matter of the indulgence metaphor. Becker writes (02 Dec. 2007), “…an emission trading system does dispose of the criticism that offsets are not desirable because they are like the indulgence system of the Middle Ages. In that system, sinners could purchase forgiveness for some of their sins without either having to repent, or having to agree to sin anymore.”
Becker’s excellent main point about cap and trade policy notwithstanding, the mistaken description of indulgences needs correction. The Catechism of the Catholic Church 1471 writes, “An indulgence is a remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven…” Becker’s mix up of forgiveness with temporal punishment is, well, forgivable, but the assertion that sinners do not have to repent or pledge to stop sinning is a misrepresentation. In 1451, the Catechism prescribes requirements of forgiveness; “Contrition is ‘sorrow of the soul and detestation for the sin committed, together with the resolution not to sin again.’”
Carbon offset programs are not environmental indulgences. Offset schemes do not require polluters to promise not to pollute again. Indeed, how could they? Nor do offsets fine (punish) the majority of pollutors. In a sense voluntary carbon offset programs are like hooks. They are the kind of hooks that some people are willing to pay to get off of so they can continue polluting with cleaner consciences.
