I don't understand the general thrust of this argument. There are carbon offset companies that are investigated according to sets of standards, specifically to

I don't understand the general thrust of this argument. There are carbon offset companies that are investigated according to sets of standards, specifically to rule out abuses like planting trees that will just get cut down again. And I understand the basic system effects of: Currently it is cheap to buy enough offsets to cancel out one year of citizenship. If everyone does it, then these plentiful opportunities dry up - whether it's running out of land to plant trees or running out of pilot programs to bury carbon, it gets more expensive. But that's a feature, not a bug. It means that over that period of time, more externalities have been captured into the system, which is exactly what we want. If companies are mandated to buy offsets and they get expensive, then it creates the incentive to create more tech to be able to sequester more carbon. Which is what we want.