Carbon Offsets for Everyone

When thinking about climate change, it's easy to get overwhelmed or discouraged. What's hard about thinking about climate change is that it seems to require lots of people to do things for change to happen. So you think, "Why should I do this if no one else is going to do it ?" So you don't do it, and no one else does. But what if you knew that there were 100 million people in the same boat that were willing to take the step if they knew others would join them? It's like a matching donation: if one person pays an amount, they're willing to pay more if they know someone else will also contribute.

A carbon offset is funding for a project that creates a reduction in carbon emissions elsewhere. The average carbon footprint per person in the US is 20 tons; carbon offsets can be measured to the point where a certain amount of funding equates to a certain number of tons of carbon dioxide removed from the atmosphere.

So sign this petition if you want to purchase carbon offsets, but want many others to join you in doing so before purchasing offsets. My idea is that you would purchase offsets when 100 other people have signed the petition. Then, when 100 people have signed the petition, everyone will know that they can offset their carbon emissions and collectively offset a lot of carbon emissions. After the first hundred have signed, the process will repeat for the next hundred and so on, until the first 1000 people have signed. For example, if you are the 310th person to sign, you should start purchasing offsets when the signature count reaches 400. In order to gain momentum, we will ratchet the process up after the first 1000 have signed, so that each person is expected to offset their emissions when the next 1000 people have signed. The process will be continue until we reach 100 million people, enough to offset close to 1/3 of US emissions.

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