Neutral is rarely considered an optimal condition, save for scuba buoyancy and, increasingly, with respect to carbon exposure. An eclectic roster of entities have announced aspirations to achieve carbon neutrality, including HSBC, Google, Super Bowl XLI, Silverjet and the 2008 presidential campaigns of John Edwards and Hilary Clinton.
As these initiatives have attracted positive recognition in the marketplace, more entities have caught on to the reputational benefits accruing from neutrality. This has, in turn, created a virtuous cycle or a "race to the top". Or has it? A growing chorus of stakeholders has begun to question the net benefit of carbon offsets.
In an attempt to distill truth from fiction, F&C Investments has put out this excellent Guide to Carbon Offsetting. This four-pager is well worth the read for the carbon curious, committed and skeptical.
Chris - thanks for tee'ing this up. It's something I'm struggling with and so is my company. For many years - we've place conservation above off-sets in terms of positive impact. But the world seems obsessed with carbon neutrality today. We done some economic modeling and could probably make some news - but would the same investment in conservation be better for the planet? I think so. Would it make news - I think not.
http://blogs.intel.com/csr
Yes, I like the tag-line of CarbonFund.org - "Reduce what you can, Offset what you can't". Energy efficiency is the real sweet spot because gains can be achieved with readily available technology that is economically competitive now. At the 2007 Ceres conference, energy efficiency was repeatedly referred to as the "first fuel". But you're correct that it is the least "sexy" of the solutions. Shame.