DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

PG&E launched its carbon-offsetting program last week. It’s called “ClimateSmart.” Ratepayers can sign up with a couple mouse clicks.

What would it cost you per month? Probably about $5. Here’s a cost estimator. You’ll need to have a recent PG&E bill handy, or ideally one from last winter and another from last summer so you can measure average consumption during peak energy-use months.

Thanks to the PV array on my roof, my monthly ClimateSmart fee should be about $0.66.

What do you get for your $5 (or $0.66) per month? According to the website,

100% of your ClimateSmart payment will go to directly funding new greenhouse gas emission reduction projects in California. PG&E will invest these funds in a range of innovative projects, such as conserving and restoring California ecosystems and capturing methane gas from dairy farms. Examples of the types of projects PG&E may invest in include the van Eck forest in Humboldt County and Garcia River forest in Mendocino County, if they are chosen through the competitive selection process.

It seems like a great deal.

Before you sign up, though, read Katherine Ellison’s analysis in Salon: Shopping for carbon credits. She investigates the “new greenhouse gas emission reduction projects in California” and learns that the project first in line for certification may well end up using ClimateSmart money to fund the construction of a new forestry building at Purdue University in Indiana.

To which any right-minded ratepayer can respond only, WTF??

Buying offsets is, at best, the lazy way out of environmental responsibility — as Ellison points out, the only true solution is to reduce emissions at their source — but this particular example is so far removed from actually reducing the carbon level in the atmosphere that instead of eco-mindfulness it inspires only jokes, e.g.: Why would anybody tack $5 onto their monthly utility bill to finance a new schoolroom at an institution whose most memorable contribution to culture is the biggest bass drum in the world?

Ellison decides not to join ClimateSmart, opting instead to save up for double-paned windows and to contribute ~$5/month to support federal election reform — which I agree ought to be at the top of the list of any realistic carbon-offsetting program. (Ellison’s article makes the case that volunteer efforts to reduce emissions are insufficient, that federal regulations are required, and further that “petro-dollar-powered Republican legislators” are never going to make the necessary regulations.)

I find no fault with her reasoning or conclusions, but I signed up for ClimateSmart anyway. I have more faith that the California Climate Action Registry will find some legitimate, non-joke-worthy ways to spend ClimateSmart donations. For example, the manure management idea. OK, maybe that’s going to inspire some jokes too, but at least the benefits are real. For example, read about the Straus Dairy’s methane digester, which not only directly reduces greenhouse gas emissions, but also generates electricity, preventing the need for other fuels to be burned, thereby indirectly reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

And if they don’t — if after six months PG&E and the Climate Action Registry are still struggling to find legitimate and productive ways to spend Climate Smart money, I’ll take back my $0.66/month and save up for another acre of rainforest.