Pay for your carbon emissions
By Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz, RedEye reporter
You can offset the carbon footprint of your car, home and air travel by funding renewable energy projects.
Chicago resident Jenna Rose made it a New Year's resolution one year to pay for the carbon she produces in air travel. Through
terrapass.com, she calculates how much carbon dioxide she is personally responsible for as a result of her flights, and how much it would cost to offset those emissions through renewable energy. So far she's paid a total of $37 for two domestic trips and one international flight, which will go to buy carbon credits that fund clean energy projects like wind energy farms.
"I'm not will to give up air travel completely, so this is an interesting way to deal with that issue," said Rose, president and managing editor of
afreshsqueeze.com, which advises Chicagoans on green living. "It's a great way to show the government how important a thing it is to the public."
In addition to TerraPass, you can try
carbonfund.org and
gocarbonzero.org.
You can also buy "green tags" directly from companies with renewable energy projects as a way of supporting those projects. Visit
green-e.org for a list.
Copyright © 2008, Tribune Interactive
