1,000 guests are expected to attend the annual Washington Conservation Voters Breakfast this year.  We will supply 50 tons (100,000lbs) of carbon offsets for the event to make it carbon neutral.  This is equal to the pollution of 5,100 gallons of gasoline, or half of a tanker truck of fuel burned. It is also equivalent to the amount of carbon absorbed by 10 acres of Douglas Fir or 50 acres of grassland in a year.

We are happy to be working with the Conservation Voters to promote policies that protect the environment. Candidates that want to follow the lead of the Conservation Voters and become carbon neutral can calculate and offset the carbon footprint of the political campaign on this website!

We have contacted every Democrat congressional incumbent and asked them to make a commitment to carbon neutrality and offset the emissions from their election campaign.  This is not something unfamiliar to them.  Each member of , whether Democrat or Republican, has a carbon neutral DC Office through the Green the capitol initiative.  However, only individual action will make their campaign green.

The excuses from some congressional ‘leaders’ for not going green reflect on the pathetic approval rating that the current Congress has, which at a whopping 11% should not surprise.  “We don’t have enough time” was the excuse from John Conyers’ Democratic campaign which does not even have a Republican opponent.  Jackie Speier’s campaign in California responded that “this is a safe district, our race was settled at the primary.”   Frequent was the line that “it’s just too expensive.” This one we heard from Ed Perlmutter in Colorado and Ellen Tauscher in California who combined control nearly $2,000,000 in campaign funds, but could not afford $400-500 worth of carbon offsets.

Others, like congressman Jim McDermott’s campaign, are almost understandable, “we really don’t have a campaign, all that we do is go back and forth from the office to the bank and pick up checks.”  The reality is that most congressional “leaders” are just interested in keeping a low  profile and cashing checks when it gets close to election day.  Issues don’t matter.

We will keep trying…

Climate change is only part of the reason that we need to free our country from fossil fuel dependence.    This video is a memorable illustration of where our oil dollars can end up.  Enjoy!

In Texas there is an oil man. His name is T. Boone Pickens and he has pumped over 150 million barrels of oil.

Pickens is a wildcatter, but now his sights are set on something truly revolutionary: Wind Power.

Pickens says that the US is “the Saudi Arabia of wind power,” and that we could supply 20% of our electrical energy by the wind in ten short years. Also, we can develop clean burning natural gas as a domestic transportation fuel instead of sending away 700 billion dollars a year to pay for foreign oil.

By Picken’s calculations, we reached global peak oil in 2005. From here on, exploration and supply of conventional fossil fuels will lose pace with energy demand. The only way to keep up is to change-and fast! Check out the Pickens Plan for energy independence at their website, and watch the video below.

California state legislators appear likely to enact two bills aimed at creating stricter standards for the voluntary carbon offset market. One focuses on truth in advertising, the other on making tougher and more uniform certifications for projects, offset retailers and registries.

Is this simply another step in the maturation of the market? Or will it actually stunt the growth and development by imposing unnecessary regulation?

There has clearly been a backlash to the overnight boom of environmentally responsible consumer goods. Just when we’re getting used to buzzwords like sustainability and eco-friendly, others come along, such as green washing.

The potential pitfalls of the carbon market are enough to overwhelm even an educated consumer. How do can you know your offset won’t be sold again to someone else? Would the project you’re offsetting have happened anyway, even without your money? Transparency in advertising and certification are no doubt good things, especially when dealing with a relatively new product and uninformed buyers.

But this proposed legislation takes the responsibility of self-regulating away from the market just as it has begun to show the ability and maturity to do so. Despite the numerous certification standards currently out there, the 2008 report on the State of the Voluntary Carbon Market finds that consumers are learning to differentiate them in terms of quality.

Even more problematic is the language of the legislation. It outlines specific project types that meet the standards for credits. Forestry, methane capture and internal combustion reduction are mentioned. Projects which adversely impact “species, habitat, ecosystems, land use, biodiversity, air quality, water supply and quality, access to food or and production of food” won’t be eligible either. Whether inadvertently or not, setting that type of precedent will put a damper on the spirit of innovation that currently makes the carbon offset market exciting and ground breaking.

Yes, the voluntary carbon market is a little like the Wild West. It does need a healthy dose of transparency, and the buyer must always beware. But the market’s beauty has always been its ability to provide a free market solution that reduces carbon most efficiently by rewarding creativity and innovation. It’d be a shame to stifle that. Something about a baby and bath water comes to mind.

To learn more about the proposed bill, click here.

When discussing the ecological cost of paper, most people focus on the inputs: the trees and resulting deforestation, the water usage, etc. But it’s easy to forget that paper and paper products leave a little something behind too. A pretty good size carbon footprint. Here are our calculations for the carbon output from copy paper:

A 500 sheet package of typical 20 lb copy paper weighs 5 lbs. Therefore, each individual sheet weighs .01 lbs. Compositionally, paper is about half cellulose, which in turn is about half carbon. The amount of carbon in a single sheet (.0025 lbs.) is then multiplied by 3.67 to account for the weight of the full CO2 molecule.

A single sheet of paper produces roughly .0092 lbs of CO2. 500 sheets produces 4.59 lbs of CO2.

According to a survey findings in Europe, an average office worker uses 10,000 printed pages per year. Nearly one fifth are printed needlessly. The CO2 created from these unnecessary pages weighs almost 16 lbs.

For ways to reduce your office paper usage, click here. We recommend not printing these tips off and posting them in your office.

For what you can’t reduce, you can offset your paper usage with Standard Carbon.

Standard Carbon President Brendan Woodward  sat down for an interview with Joshua Hicks at the Bothell Reporter newspaper.  Their conversation centered on the effects of a cap and trade market on the local economy, and the hopeful prospects for a new take on energy policy.  Joshuas article brings attention to the shift in thinking over what it means to be green, and how Republican s and Democrats are defining that.

Danny Westneat wrote a very positive article about Standard Carbon’s carbon offset business and the changing face of politics.  Brendan Woodward talked with the Times about business, politics, and religion.

We know that these are not the best subjects for polite company, but Check it out!

Ron Sims is a crusader. Since October 2007, plans have been in the works to make greenhouse gas mitigation one of the required elements for a SEPA permit (State Environmental Policy Act). This means that many contractors, and even building supplies companies doing business in King County Washington will have to account for their CO2.

The County has prepared an excel spreadsheet that can be used to measure the Carbon Footprint of construction activities, as required by the regulation. It is not clear, however, what the appropriate and accepted steps for avoiding greenhouse gas emissions will be for compliance with the King County Global warming Initiative.

Carbon Offsetting should be accepted by the county for compliance with the new SEPA regulations. This would provide a streamlined, easily verified way for constructions projects to assist the environment, without sacrificing their quality or proven construction methods. Contact Standard Carbon if you would like to make your work site carbon neutral.

The two front runners have overlooked their own contributions to global warming.  Neither Barack Obama, or John McCain is carbon neutral, Yet both support Cap and Trade.  Shouldn’t they be walking the talk?  Members of the US Congress are mitigating their global warming pollution.  Hillary Clinton has offset hers; heck, even the DNC’s national convention is slated to be carbon neutral.  Its time that the big boys get with the program.