This past week we took our first flight with baby. There were tons of things to think about- what to pack, whether she'd behave...I have to admit that the whole situation was a little overwhelming. Things were relatively uneventful though (whew!), leaving me time to think about the carbon emissions produced during our flights. I'd heard about online calculators that you could use to calculate your carbon emissions from travel and purchase products to offset the emissions, but admittedly had never used any. I figured that if I truly wanted to make an impact then I wouldn't fly, but with family throughout the country that really isn't an option.
I just did a search to see what products are out there and found far more than I'd imagined! Luckily Tufts University created a Voluntary Carbon Offset Information Portal to help filter through the information. They divided the evaluated companies into three groups: recommended, recommended with reservation, and not recommended. The 4 they recommend are: atmosfair, climate friendly, myclimate, and NativeEnergy. Most of these sites also allow you to offset things other than flight emissions, such as car emissions and home/office. Using climate friendly, it cost $36.33 to offset a trip for 2 from Washington DC to Tampa, FL; the same trip was $60 using Atmosfair, $40 using myclimate, and only $12 on Native Energy.
I decided that overall I like the sites, if for no other reason than to assuage the guilt I feel from flying; at a cost of upwards of $60 for a standard trip, it can be a bit pricey though.
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