Carbon offsetting

All my suspicions about this were confirmed on reading a slip of paper which came in the veg box yesterday.

The farmer behind the co-operative which grows the veg wrote: "I have just entered our data into a carbon offsetting website which tells me I need to plant exactly 16,506 trees to offset all out transport-related emissions. No ifs, no buts; that is a precise figure and for a modest consideration they can arrange the conscience-salving plantations. Intellectually, morally and scientifically, carbon offsetting and carbon trading (especially as conceived by our Government) are very dubious and I am delighted to see more articles in the press questioning the validity of what is often PR-drive greenwash".

Hear, hear.

Right, I'm off now to start the car just for the hell of it.