In defense of carbon offsets

My Pick-Up displaying its carbon offset

Today Crunchy Chicken had a post about purchasing offsets for travel. She used Terrapass. There is terrapass for cars, for your home, for travel, for college dorm life, even for weddings. I am familiar with terrapass, I saw it first on Living with Ed, and I have been buying offsets from them for my cars, in particular the Suzuki and the Tacoma Pick Up for a couple of years now. I would use the bus sytem to work, but working a late shift (2- 10:30pm) makes that near impossible-So i figure if I must drive why not make some good out of it? The Suzuki is really inexpensive to drive, gets a good rating from the EPA and is very inexpensive to buy a Terrapass offset for - Under $25 annually. The truck while being more comfortable (Think A/C, CD here folks) costs a bit more for it's offset (about $75). My low prices for offsets are due to the fact I don't drive much. And I think it is important to state that if I drive, I want the most for the $$$, and using an offset at least helps give back something. Terrapass invests the money received for the offsets into "green" energy- wind farms, manure methane, etc. etc. If I am going to drive and I am, I will use a carbon offset. There are a lot of carbon offsets out there- Terrapass, Native Energy, Carbon Fund.org to name a few- Of course a lot of times, like now I choose to drive my Honda scooter to work. It is the most efficient form of travel I own. Well that is not true- I do own a bike. But that ain't happening. So I drive the scoot, and I just watch out for the bugs at night. And never smile. And hope they come out with an affordable electric car soon. And if Terrapass is good enough for Ed Begley Jr., it is good enough for me!