'Shock and Trance'

In my daily perusing of the blogosphere, I have come across a really interesting article by Andrew Revkin of the New York Times. Mr. Revkin has been thinking about Obama's plans to combat global warming, and wondering how they are going to be impacted by the economic crisis -- is Obama going to use green jobs to help us pull us out of this mess, or will the climate fall to the wayside as we utilize the cheapest sources of energy available, even if that means continuing to harm our health and our efforts to stop global warming. Many of us in the industry have been pondering these questions recently, but Mr. Revkin cited an interesting frame to approaching our forward thinking -- the "Shock and Trance" of global warming.

Basically, one of the points of the article is that, as a society, we are at times "Shocked" into really addressing global warming (e.g. when there are sharp heatwaves like the ones seen in 2003, Katrinas happen, and big sheets of ice break off in the Arctic), and then we are "Tranced" into a state of complicity during times of low climatic activity. But as Mr. Revkin asks:

The question is, can societies commit to a sustained effort to move beyond fossil fuels (and to curtail the destruction of tropical forests) even as nature runs hot and cold — and especially as the economy does the same?

The answer, we all hope, is yes.

We are currently living in strange times. The earth is warming and the economy is slowing, and this is giving us the best opportunity that we have ever had to really fight global warming, modernize our energy sources, and boost our economy with green jobs. Everyday here at Carbonfund.org, people and businesses come to us and ask what they can do today. Not everyone has the means to offset their yearly emissions, but people are conscious of their carbon footprint and are taking action to affordably offset what they can -- a plane ride here or there for example. Big corporations may not be offsetting the footprint of their entire operations, but you see some that are taking significant steps to offsetting a large part of it (see: Hyundai).

People want action, and economic crisis or not, they want it now. The carbon offset market is a barometer for our national desire to see change in the way we view energy and our responsibility for our carbon footprint -- and that barometer is pointing towards action.

Fight global warming now. Offset today.