TRAVEL’S CONTRIBUTIONS TO EMISSIONS: Travel contributes significantly to carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the atmosphere; travel makes up 8% of more of all carbon emissions considering transport, accommodation, shopping, and meals.
CARBON REMOVAL IS NECESSARY: The atmosphere that protects Earth from the sun and preserves our stable climate has limits to the emissions that it can contain. It now contains so much CO2 that even if all emissions halted tomorrow, we would still have to clean our atmosphere because it takes hundreds to thousands of years to remove by natural processes alone. Scientists agree that carbon removal is necessary to avoid dangerous climate change. (Columbia University Earth Sciences Institute)
CONVENTIONAL OFFSETTING AND REMOVAL: Offsetting emissions is not the same as removing them permanently. With carbon offsetting, the purchaser of the offset compensates for its own emissions by paying someone else to avoid emissions elsewhere. Carbon offsetting project examples include sustaining a forest for example or supporting renewable energy projects.
WE HAVE TO START NOW: Scaling up carbon removal will take decades, therefore the time to begin talking about it and testing new approaches is now.
TREES NEED OUR HELP: We can’t just plant more trees to solve our atmosphere’s carbon dioxide problem because the amount of carbon dioxide that has to be removed is too great in the desired timeline to do it. One estimate for doing this with trees alone is 700 years. To keep our planet’s climate stable, we need to be at net zero emissions by 2050.
TOMORROW’S AIR CAN HELP: Joining the Tomorrow’s Air collective is a way for travelers to network, learn and spread the word about carbon removal today. Those who are able can also pay to remove carbon dioxide through the collective. Whether you subscribe to Tomorrow’s Air for carbon removal or simply join to help spread the word, the important thing is to understand its importance and do what you can to support it.
Source links: Can Removing Carbon From the Atmosphere Save Us from Climate Catastrophe, Columbia University Earth Sciences InstituteExamining the Viability of Planting Trees to Help Mitigate Climate Change, NASA
