ResponsibleTravel.com Ditches Offsets in Favor of Promoting Reductions

Last night, CBC's As it Happens featured Justin Francis, co-founder and managing director of British travel agency Responsible Travel. Responsible Travel was [at least one of] the first travel agent[s] to offer carbon offsets, way back in 2002. This month, they decided to be among the first to ditch them entirely. Their website explains their revised stance pretty clearly:

Say 'NO' to carbon offsetting and 'YES' to carbon reduction.

Here's the beginning of his As it Happens interview. He outlines the gist of his stance:

I felt [offsets] were being used in the wrong way. I think what's really important for us in our lives now is that we make changes to reduce the amount of carbon we're emitting. And the way carbon offsets were being used was by people who were making no changes to their lives, who were continuing to pollute, travel, fly, in exactly the same ways as they'd always done before, but by paying a little bit of money, were offsetting their guilt. [...]

To get to the level of carbon reduction we need, North America, Europe, Britain, needs to reduce its absolute amount of carbon that it emits. And the problem with carbon offsets is they're distracting us from that need. They're convincing us we can go on with no change to our lives, but paying a little bit of guilt money to offset our emissions.

He then spoke about his impressions of carbon neutral businesses vs. carbon aware businesses (my phrase, not his):

What I'm much more impressed with is not a political party, or a business, or an organization that has paid money for carbon offsets. What I'm much more impressed with is a political party or a business or organizations which can tell me how much they've reduced the absolute carbon that they emit into the atmosphere. and that year on year, they've managed to reduce those emissions. That lends far more credibility to your organization than having paid a little bit of money to offset your carbon emissions.

He also touched on offset quality and the particular challenges of forestry offsets (as discussed in my last post):

One of the most popular forms of carbon offset is to fund the planting of trees because trees absorb carbon dioxide. So by planting a new tree that would not have been planted, you are reducing the amount of carbon in the atmosphere. And yet, the scientists are increasingly questioning whether that's valid, because what happens is after a time, that tree will die, and it will rot. When that tree rots, it re-emits all the carbon back into the atmosphere. So there is some debate about the science behind some forms of carbon offset.

But ultimately, he brought it back to his core message of reductions above all:

But my point is not necessarily about whether some offsets are good or bad. My point is more about they can not be used as an excuse to avoid the most important thing of all, which is reducing the amount of carbon that you emit.

So how does a travel agency make a business case around encouraging people to fly less? They promote taking the train, vacationing closer to home, avoiding domestic flights, not taking lots of short vacations, and enjoying fewer, longer vacations. Sounds easy enough, right? This is what my family has done in recent years. Last Christmas, we took the train over 2000 miles round trip to Saskatchewan to visit family. The train ride was an adventure in itself, and we were able to tack on a free stopover in Jasper, Alberta. This Christmas, we're flying almost halfway around the world to see family in Norway, but we're staying put for over a month and we're taking advantage of Iceland Air's free Reykjavik stopover policy and a return layover in Copenhagen to get two extra mini-vacations-within-a-vacation. Three trips for the carbon of one! The last time we flew to visit our family in Norway was over three years ago for another month-long visit. This summer we didn't travel at all, but instead visited Victoria, BC, this fall, just a short jaunt from our home in Vancouver. How have you reduced your travel emissions?

While I have purchased (high-quality) offsets for my own unavoidable air travel, I absolutely agree with Francis' core message. We need to achieve actual CO2e reductions; we can't afford to just offset the status quo. I think it is very gutsy for a green travel agency to take this stance, but I also think the way he's communicating his decision is clear, eloquent, and completely rational. However, I don't think we should throw the baby out with the bathwater here.

Why not encourage--and even emphasize--absolute carbon reductions while still allowing and seeing the value in offsets when travel can't be avoided?

[The entire CBC interview is the first 8 min 10 sec of this archive audio at cbc.ca (autoloading WMV link).]