For my friend Flit's birthday, I offset the carbon from the flight she and her partner are going to be taking to Israel.
Quite a 21st century thing to do, but Flit's not a material girl, and I thought the idea would tickle her.
I went with http://www.co2balance.com/ . They calculate that a return flight for two people from the UK to Israel produces 1.58 tonnes of CO2. A scary amount of gas indeed.
They have tree-planting schemes in various remote parts of England. But the scheme that caught my attention was the Kenyan lightbulb scheme.
Here the money is used to provide, free of charge, low energy light bulbs to the Masai Mara region of Kenya. The idea is over the lifetime of these bulbs, the saving in fossil fuels will match the amount needed to propel my friends to the Holy Land.
I'm not blogging this to bathe in a warm glow of green smugness. And the green colour scheme of the blog was never meant to be symbolic. I just found it amusing and relevant and probably something that will become an increasing part of life from now - like £10 Chinese fairy lights that don't work and suffocating anti-terrorism.
Although, anyone looking to buy me a pressie could do worse than offset some of the effect of the 20,000 miles I drove last year (5.2 tonnes of CO2.)
Happy Birthday, Flit, and Nesia Tovah to you both.
1 comment:
Pffff! I'm working on the basis that it's better than nought. To be really smug I'd have to chastise my friend for her carbon gluttony and insist she cycles to Jerusalem.
Just in case you missed it first time - I'll make the same noise, except this time I'll make it extra-long and thumb my nose at you at the same time.
Ppfffffffffffff !!
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