The Carbon Offset Conundrum

A paper in the journal Nature Climate Change concludes there is limited accountability for corporations that fail to achieve their climate change mitigation targets. The analysis shows 9% of company decarbonization plans missed their goals, while 31% “disappeared.”

However, 60% of companies met their targets. While this might initially seem like good news, it may not be leading to genuine climate action.

This week's podcast guest, Ketan Joshi, a consultant and researcher for nonprofit organizations in the climate sector, explains that many corporations are not actually decarbonizing their supply chains, but rather relying on buying renewable energy certificates and carbon credits to "offset" additional carbon emissions from their business.

While carbon offsets are often touted as a way to directly fund climate action on the ground, Joshi stresses there is no verifiable way to track how much is funding these projects. Typically, credits are purchased from a broker, and 90% of these intermediaries arranging such deals on the voluntary carbon market don't share their data.

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Image Credit: The 2015 Paris Agreement stipulates that countries must reduce carbon emissions in order to limit warming to 1.5°C, or at least well below 2°C. Image by jwvein via Pixabay (Public domain).

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Timestamps

(00:00) Are companies actually decarbonizing?

(16:06)  The rise of climate litigation

(31:00) Carbon removal tech as an offset

(42:00) What is GreenSky?

(50:38) Credits