6 ms·

Carbon offsets were always a very lightly disguised scam. Who knew?

mtnGoat 5y ago
yea.. not a very good idea to invest in forests unless someone is going to actively log, graze or manage them, otherwise its just destined to burn and there goes your carbon. as we are learning now.
- mtnGoat 5y ago
  guess the downvotes are from folks that dont understand how forests work? :)
  - user-the-name 5y ago
    Most forests do not burn.
    - elihu 5y ago
      Over what timescale? Forest fires were a regular occurrence in North America before fire suppression was the standard policy. Now it looks like they're happening quite a bit despite that policy.
      - user-the-name 5y ago
        Pretty long time spans. There are a lot of forests where fires are not part of the life cycle.
      - cmrdporcupine 5y ago
        Large scale forest fires have never been a large part of the lifecycle of the moist northeast. That might change, but around the great lakes region at least our forest type is entirely different than the western half of the continent. Rain is fairly consistent here. The first nations did practice controlled burns for the sake of wildlife management (to increase open grazing land) for sure, and smaller scale forest fires did/do happen. But nothing like out west.
        mtnGoat 5y ago
        Agreed. The eastern forests don’t burn like the western ones do. I guess my original posts were more aimed at the western coniferous forests, which is what this is related to.
        nick__m 5y ago
        Is this northeast enough: https://vocm.com/2021/08/10/forest-fire-burning-east-of-churchill-falls-near-trans-labrador-highway/ https://vocm.com/2021/08/10/forest-fire-burning-east-of-chur... ? Forest fire are sufficiently cyclical that some trees, like the pitch pine, depends on them for the seeds to open.
        cmrdporcupine 5y ago
        That's an entirely different biome, boreal/northern conifer forest on the Canadian shield. What does that have to do with the great lakes and atlantic northeast? Forest here is composed of oak beech maple and some white pine and rainfall is consistent.
    - themaninthedark 5y ago
      Over the course of time, most forests do burn. Recently, there was a story about how when we keep the forests from burning we are causing major issues.
      - user-the-name 5y ago
        Some. Not most.
  - rahimiali 5y ago
    forests go in cycles. averaged over time, any given acre of forest contains some carbon.
- gruez 5y ago
  >otherwise its just destined to burn and there goes your carbon It depends on what you're comparing it against. A forest contains more biomass (and therefore more carbon) than a grass field or a corn field. If before tree planting a plot of land had 100 Tons of biomass, and after planting + growth it had 200 Tons, then you sequestered 100 tons of carbon. If it goes up in flames some of that biomass will get released, but it will eventually grow back, recapturing all the lost carbon. With that in mind, I don't see anything fraudulent about selling carbon offsets during the initial planting. Sure, it's not as good as burying carbon deep underground, but you're still sequestering carbon.
  - mtnGoat 5y ago
    Agreed, but it’s only temporary because the tree will burn at some point releasing carbon dioxide. At least in any coniferous forest in the western half of North America. Don’t get me wrong, it’s much better than nothing. I just think they should probably pick locations that aren’t as prone to burning as the colville forests. So the carving stays locked a bit more long term.
    - gruez 5y ago
      >I just think they should probably pick locations that aren’t as prone to burning as the colville forests. Or apply a discount factor. eg. for a simple model: if a forest has n Tons of sequestered carbon when fully grown, but every 40 years it gets burned bare for 4 years, then it's really only sequestering 0.9n tons of carbon over the long run. > So the carving stays locked a bit more long term. I think you got the adjectives flipped. If anything the sequester is long term, but there's cyclical short term release/recapture.
  - ErikVandeWater 5y ago
    > If before tree planting a plot of land had 100 Tons of biomass, and after planting + growth it had 200 Tons, then you sequestered 100 tons of carbon. Trees are pure carbon?
vegetablepotpie 5y ago
Your comment does not give readers anything to learn or benefit from. If your goal is to broadcast to your political tribe on HN that you have the right beliefs, then good job, you’ve accomplished your goal sir. If you wanted to provide an insightful comment that promotes curiosity, then we’ll need a little bit more effort from you. What do you mean by “carbon offsets are a scam”? Does that mean that the way that some are implemented (I.e. the carbon credit system in California) are scam? Do you mean that the idea of them and any possible implementation is a scam? Do you mean that the issue that they are designed to counter (climate change) is a scam? What do you mean by your comment and why?
tylerhou 5y ago
Saying carbon credits are a scam is like saying phones are a scam — they both come in different qualities. (If one phone model’s battery explodes, do all phones explode?) There are various ways of offsetting emissions that aren’t vulnerable to leakage. For example, you can capture methane from landfills and burn it. Since methane is a much more potent greenhouse gas than CO2, burning it has a net greenhouse reduction. And there’s no chance of leakage — water, CO2 and oxygen aren’t going to spontaneously turn back into methane in the atmosphere. In addition, in some cases it’s more cost effective to make a mostly reliable system and correct errors than to build perfectly reliable systems. Would you rather plant 2M T of trees and have none burn down or 10M T and have 20% burn down?
dang 5y ago
Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially on divisive topics. It's flamebait, and we're trying for curious conversation here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

yea.. not a very good idea to invest in forests unless someone is going to actively log, graze or manage them, otherwise its just destined to burn and there goes your carbon. as we are learning now.

mtnGoat 5y ago
guess the downvotes are from folks that dont understand how forests work? :)
- user-the-name 5y ago
  Most forests do not burn.
  - elihu 5y ago
    Over what timescale? Forest fires were a regular occurrence in North America before fire suppression was the standard policy. Now it looks like they're happening quite a bit despite that policy.
    - user-the-name 5y ago
      Pretty long time spans. There are a lot of forests where fires are not part of the life cycle.
    - cmrdporcupine 5y ago
      Large scale forest fires have never been a large part of the lifecycle of the moist northeast. That might change, but around the great lakes region at least our forest type is entirely different than the western half of the continent. Rain is fairly consistent here. The first nations did practice controlled burns for the sake of wildlife management (to increase open grazing land) for sure, and smaller scale forest fires did/do happen. But nothing like out west.
      - mtnGoat 5y ago
        Agreed. The eastern forests don’t burn like the western ones do. I guess my original posts were more aimed at the western coniferous forests, which is what this is related to.
      - nick__m 5y ago
        Is this northeast enough: https://vocm.com/2021/08/10/forest-fire-burning-east-of-churchill-falls-near-trans-labrador-highway/ https://vocm.com/2021/08/10/forest-fire-burning-east-of-chur... ? Forest fire are sufficiently cyclical that some trees, like the pitch pine, depends on them for the seeds to open.
        cmrdporcupine 5y ago
        That's an entirely different biome, boreal/northern conifer forest on the Canadian shield. What does that have to do with the great lakes and atlantic northeast? Forest here is composed of oak beech maple and some white pine and rainfall is consistent.
  - themaninthedark 5y ago
    Over the course of time, most forests do burn. Recently, there was a story about how when we keep the forests from burning we are causing major issues.
    - user-the-name 5y ago
      Some. Not most.
- rahimiali 5y ago
  forests go in cycles. averaged over time, any given acre of forest contains some carbon.
gruez 5y ago
>otherwise its just destined to burn and there goes your carbon It depends on what you're comparing it against. A forest contains more biomass (and therefore more carbon) than a grass field or a corn field. If before tree planting a plot of land had 100 Tons of biomass, and after planting + growth it had 200 Tons, then you sequestered 100 tons of carbon. If it goes up in flames some of that biomass will get released, but it will eventually grow back, recapturing all the lost carbon. With that in mind, I don't see anything fraudulent about selling carbon offsets during the initial planting. Sure, it's not as good as burying carbon deep underground, but you're still sequestering carbon.
- mtnGoat 5y ago
  Agreed, but it’s only temporary because the tree will burn at some point releasing carbon dioxide. At least in any coniferous forest in the western half of North America. Don’t get me wrong, it’s much better than nothing. I just think they should probably pick locations that aren’t as prone to burning as the colville forests. So the carving stays locked a bit more long term.
  - gruez 5y ago
    >I just think they should probably pick locations that aren’t as prone to burning as the colville forests. Or apply a discount factor. eg. for a simple model: if a forest has n Tons of sequestered carbon when fully grown, but every 40 years it gets burned bare for 4 years, then it's really only sequestering 0.9n tons of carbon over the long run. > So the carving stays locked a bit more long term. I think you got the adjectives flipped. If anything the sequester is long term, but there's cyclical short term release/recapture.
- ErikVandeWater 5y ago
  > If before tree planting a plot of land had 100 Tons of biomass, and after planting + growth it had 200 Tons, then you sequestered 100 tons of carbon. Trees are pure carbon?

vegetablepotpie 5y ago

Your comment does not give readers anything to learn or benefit from. If your goal is to broadcast to your political tribe on HN that you have the right beliefs, then good job, you’ve accomplished your goal sir. If you wanted to provide an insightful comment that promotes curiosity, then we’ll need a little bit more effort from you. What do you mean by “carbon offsets are a scam”? Does that mean that the way that some are implemented (I.e. the carbon credit system in California) are scam? Do you mean that the idea of them and any possible implementation is a scam? Do you mean that the issue that they are designed to counter (climate change) is a scam? What do you mean by your comment and why?

tylerhou 5y ago

Saying carbon credits are a scam is like saying phones are a scam — they both come in different qualities. (If one phone model’s battery explodes, do all phones explode?) There are various ways of offsetting emissions that aren’t vulnerable to leakage. For example, you can capture methane from landfills and burn it. Since methane is a much more potent greenhouse gas than CO2, burning it has a net greenhouse reduction. And there’s no chance of leakage — water, CO2 and oxygen aren’t going to spontaneously turn back into methane in the atmosphere. In addition, in some cases it’s more cost effective to make a mostly reliable system and correct errors than to build perfectly reliable systems. Would you rather plant 2M T of trees and have none burn down or 10M T and have 20% burn down?

dang 5y ago

Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially on divisive topics. It's flamebait, and we're trying for curious conversation here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html