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Carbon Offsets
Each one of us needs to be aware that we all have to adapt to this reality and reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. With the help of simple daily gestures, we can change our behavior and all pitch in to help the planet.
Climate change
Industrialization is behind manmade climate change. In just one hundred years, greenhouse gas emissions have risen 30%. Our increasingly modern lifestyles, which require modern transportation, agriculture, and housing, produce millions of tons of greenhouse gases every year. In fact, though they only represent 20% of the world population, industrialized countries are responsible for more than 60% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Effects of climate change
Any increase in the amount of greenhouses gases leads to intensification of the greenhouse effect. This in turn leads to warmer climates that progressively and irrevocably affect the planet’s ecosystems. Moreover, global warming worsens the great disparity that already exists between richer and poorer countries. Developing countries are unable to cope with the effects of climate change and protect themselves from the consequences of this phenomenon. Global warming has a direct impact on many aspects of the lives of world’s poorer populations, including food security, access to heath care and drinking water, housing, and proximity to sources of energy. There is still much that we do not know about climate change, including how fast it is happening and the size of its impact. This being said, we do know that we need to make sure this phenomenon doesn’t get any worse, today, in order to protect the generations of tomorrow.
Why reduce our carbon emissions?
The two main greenhouse gases are carbon dioxide (CO2), which is responsible for 60% of the greenhouse effect, and methane (CH4). However, while methane’s life span in the atmosphere is relatively short, carbon dioxide can stay there for more than one hundred years. This is why it is important to start reducing our carbon emissions today.
The highest increase in carbon emissions comes from the transportation industry.
Increases in traffic and vehicle use are the main causes behind the large carbon emissions caused by transportation. Just like overland travel, air travel also produces large quantities of greenhouse gases. Unfortunately, technological innovation in the airline industry has not managed to compensate for the strong increase in airline traffic that has been observed in the last few decades.
Even though it is impossible to cancel carbon emissions produced by air travel, is it possible to “offset” these by voluntarily participating in projects aimed at reducing CO2 emissions. Since July 2008, Uniktour has offset all carbon emissions related to its employees’ air travel.
We would like to invite you to do the same and offset the emissions that will be produced by the trip you are preparing. You can calculate the CO2 produced by your flight, familiarize yourself with sustainable development projects supported by GERES (Groupe Energies Renouvelables Et Solidarité) and participate in these projects in order to compensate for the CO2 emissions produced by your trip.
For example, during a return flight from Montreal to Paris, each passenger produces an average of 2.43 tons of CO2. The environmental cost of this CO2 is now valued at $80. Passengers can then choose to voluntarily invest CAD $80 to finance a sustainable development project in another country, thus helping reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Note that such donations are tax deductible and that you will receive a proper tax receipt, should you decide to compensate for your carbon emissions. There are now many reliable tools to help you calculate the environmental cost of your carbon emissions.
If you would like to know more about the guiding principles behind carbon offsets, our travel consultants and customer service will be happy to answer your questions.
Thank you for getting involved.
