I'm always dubious about using an airline's recommended provider. Carbon offsetting can be a bit of a scam sometime. Is there a site which rates them?

I'm yet to be convinced that offsetting is at all helpful. Isn't it just a way for the rich to buy their way out of guilt?

Yeah but there must be some way, like if for every mile you fly you spend 5 minutes at night without heat or light....so wrap up warm and go to bed at dusk a few nights every month.

Carbon off setting is rubbish. check cheatneutral
http://www.cheatneutral.com/

Well - the views expressed are reasonable - but.....sometimes activites which emit CO2 have to be done. Surely we should be aiming to be neutral, and that in itself would suggest we need to take action to off-set certain necessary activities; like flying long haul for business; maybe we can find real off-setting programmes that are not rip offs and do make a difference - thats gotta be a good thing - not just for guilt, but for the planet?

Without a doubt, the idea that there is nothing you can do about the carbon that is emitted is not a reality, reducing what you do and then finding the right offsetting partner to work with, this all contributes to the move in the right direction. But in reality we jump on planes too easily and government taxes on aviation fuel is not high enough by half.

There are some standards you can use to judge carbon offsets. <a href="http://www.davidsuzuki.org/Climate_Change/What_You_Can_Do/carbon_offsets.asp">This article</a> talks about VCS, Green-e, and The Gold Standard.

All three specifically exclude tree planting because that does not take carbon out of circulation, it just traps it in a tree for the life of the tree.

I have to say that the current reality of investing in alternative energies without a global commitment for reduction in consumption, just frees up fossil fuels for more business as usual.

Best solution: Don't take the flight and invest all the flight money, your pension and change in the piggy bank in some sort of sustainable enterprise, be it for energy production or political change.

Offsetting is just a guilt trip .. it's a no brainer, we just must use less carbon based sources while staying focussed on getting more from what we do use (i.e. a lot more efficiency) And i thoroughly endorse viewing www.cheatneutral.com and networking it to the sceptics as a very valid and easily digested argument !!

check out www.atmosfair.de
If you're gonna go with an offset company these guys are probably the best

Bee 2, you asked if there were any exceptional Carbon Offset schemes out there, well as we know Carbon Offsetting is a tricky business & many aspects of it worry me. For a more holistic approach check out http://www.ozgreen.org.au/news.php & see link on offsetting.We are not accredited but we work by purchasing the tress from locals,employing locals to do the work & we plant trees that produce food.Great!

This is geographically specific, but if you need to get from Dublin - London, consider using ferry + train. If you travel mid-week, there's a direct train from Hollyhead to London that takes 4 hours. Door to door for ferry + train is 7-8 hours, versus 4-5 hours for the plane. That's not a huge difference. Also at 88 EUR the ferry and train is prob. half the average plane flight cost.

I just thought I'd plant a tree, and it would easily compensate for the emissions of one flight during its lifetime.

The best is to do your own offsetting: give up something that you would have done otherwise. Don't buy the new television, don't use the car for a month, or give up meat. Read Chris Goodall's excellent analysis of why all carbon offsetting projects to date are ineffective: http://url.ie/pn3
Essentially, most would have happened anyway, and you are therefore are not paying for something additional.

Yes! However if they were to carry only passengers they would be even more efficient. For example here is a comparission

London to Tangier by plane 5 hours,435Kg/CO2
48 hours by Eurostar, sleeper trains & ferry, 63 Kg/CO2

I'd have to say no. The figures bandied about for ferry travel are way off the mark, often in the 50-100gCO2e/km/pax range. Ferries are a complex nut to crack and in my most recent attempt I'm coming out at flying being a cleaner option.
I did the figures for an Ireland/France trip by ferry, in a car with 4 adults. The results show the ferry at 87 kg CO2e/trip as compared to 56kg CO2e for airtravel. Have a look at http://theblog.carbontracking.com/?p=12 to see what you think of the figures.

Interesting, and as you say a tough nut to crack! I'll look into the carbon tracking stuff. Nice one small cog!

Just to echo smallcog (and based on reading calculations done elsewhere, rather than calculations of my own): high-speed ferries in particular have a footprint similar to flying (not surprising, they are essentially jet engines on water); likewise, long-haul trains: providing sleeper accommodation means they carry fewer passengers, so the fuel consumption per passenger kilometre is about the same as flying.
Mary M.

Now that's an excellent question. I supposed it must be more beneficial just dealing with electronic presents that physical ones, but perhaps hard to qualify.