Diana Wallis MEP commits to balancing CO2 emissions

5.34.20pm BST (GMT +0100) Mon 6th Jun 2005

As 'Green Week' got underway last week, local Euro MP Diana Wallis, committed to personally 'balancing' Carbon Dioxide emissions by supporting projects in the developing world by way of 'compensation'.

Liberal Democrat Diana Wallis MEP said, "Through work my in the European Parliament, one of the issues I am involved with is the effect of climate change on the Arctic region. But every flight I take I know contributes to climate change because obviously, when burned, aviation fuel emits greenhouse gases. For those of us MEPs in the north, having to fly to Brussels is pretty much unavoidable."

"So what to do? I was alerted by a constituent to a website, which explains that because one tonne of CO2 has the same impact on climate change wherever in the world it is emitted - or saved - my flight from Leeds/Bradford to Brussels can be 'Carbon-Balanced' by investing in my choice of sustainable climate friendly projects, which offset carbon."

"On one site, for example, Greenstop.net, by using the Carbon emissions calculator I can calculate that travelling by air from Leeds/Bradford to Brussels return will cost me about £3. The payment (which can be done over the website by credit card) will go to a project I choose. (For example one project in Mexico helps local farmers to establish environmentally and socially beneficial forestry)."

"I want to use Green Week to formally announce that I will be signing up to this way of personally 'balancing' CO2 emissions. This is a small contribution in the overall scheme of things, but if more and more people take responsibility for the impact they have individually on the environment then we can start to turn things around."

Notes:

Green Week is 31 May to 3 June with World Environment Day on 5 June

The website for www.Greenstop.net says: Every flight you take contributes to climate change. You can make a quick, easy and inexpensive difference by investing in sustainable climate friendly projects.

Another site www.climatepartner.com says : The avoidance or reduction of emissions is often not feasible, or would be linked to unreasonably high costs. Various methods have therefore been developed in order to mitigate past and partly unavoidable emissions in a cheaper and easier way and so neutralize their negative effects on the climate. One can hereby distinguish between compensation and offsetting.

Globally effective emissions like CO2 can be compensated for on a global scale, this means that caused emissions are being neutralized by emission-reduction projects somewhere else, resulting in zero additional emissions globally. Because it is insignificant where on earth emissions are produced or reduced, one can talk of genuine emissions compensation.