Babyhagrid
Well-known member
People who knowingly contribute to industries that danger the future of the planet?
Carbon offsetting for expeditions
- Thread starter Badlad
- Start date
nobrotson
Active member
Don't bother, he knows that his flippant straw man arguments are self evidently bollocks. He knows you can quite easily travel the world without flying and that no one isarguing to stop cultural exchanges via travel. If he doesn't realise that then he's equally not worth your time.
He also seems aware that he's distracting from the point of this thread by getting people banging on about other topics like overpopulation, rather than us discussing how effective offsetting might be for caving expeditions, and what the alternative solutions are.
Aila made the point well earlier that when we start individualizing these problems, that's when we really lose. So use your energy to resist that rather than get trapped in it.
alastairgott
Well-known member
I’m in Spain, one or two traveled by plane, some travelled by (short ferry and car) and some by (long ferry and car). We are an institution to the local town, with a fountain contributed to by previous years of expeditions to the area.
This carbon neutral stuff is surely a lot like a balanced diet. In the grand scheme of things the expedition has had a positive effect despite one or two flights here or there.
Mulu is also an institution.
Why are we lambasting (publicly) those institutions that have been going for years, please don’t air your dirty laundry on here.
This carbon neutral stuff is surely a lot like a balanced diet. In the grand scheme of things the expedition has had a positive effect despite one or two flights here or there.
Mulu is also an institution.
Why are we lambasting (publicly) those institutions that have been going for years, please don’t air your dirty laundry on here.
Chocolate fireguard
Active member
Perhaps a bit more cola and a bit less red wine in those Kalimotxos tonight?
cap n chris
Well-known member
There are entire nations that rely on international air tourism; making pleasure/leisure/holiday flights the new witch hunt and trying to whip up opprobrium towards anyone doing so (and pretending that the majority of people support the stance) paints the forum as a crackpot corner, imo. Qatar and its population is presumably going to evaporate into the ether, as it has gone full banana with becoming a tourist/Grand Prix desination etc.. You can't catch a bus there in your alloted annual holiday allowance time.
cap n chris
Well-known member
People knowingly contribute to ideologies that endanger the population of the planet?
JasonC
Well-known member
There are other nations whose entire existence is threatened by climate heating (low-lying island ones) and those that risk becoming uninhabitable (parts of Africa and the Gulf). They also have populations.
[Apologies for taking the off-topic bait]
In the end silicate weathering will eliminate the CO2 and temperatures will fall. Won’t even take that long, a blink of an eye in geological terms. The planet will be fine. Hopefully with fewer humans taking up less of the sustainable biomass than now, because that has got seriously out of hand.
I’d be more paranoid about global cooling if I were you. We need to keep a chunk of CO2 to hand just in case. What we are currently doing is turning fossil fuels into rock. That might be a mistake.
I’d be more paranoid about global cooling if I were you. We need to keep a chunk of CO2 to hand just in case. What we are currently doing is turning fossil fuels into rock. That might be a mistake.
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Back to the OP. I'm more interested in what expeditions can or should be doing to counter act carbon emissions that contribute to climate change. I get the 'we're all doomed' and it 'won't make a difference' or 'I don't believe in it' argument, but I'd rather hear some constructive ideas please. There have been quite a few and this discussion has given me some good ideas, thank you. Whether we like it or not, expeditions do need to think about this especially if they are applying for grants, etc.
This is an extract from an email I got this morning from an airport hotel I booked:
”We make sustainable hotel stays easy. At Radisson Hotel Group we care for our guests, our people and our planet and aim to be Net Zero by 2050. The clear actions of the Hotel Sustainability Basics or a full-fledged eco-label make our sustainability engagement visible from the guestroom to meetings & events. With unique solutions such as 100% carbon neutral Radisson Meetings, we help you to meet your sustainability goals. Together we can make a real difference!“
They might even be synergising across cross-functional boundaries - the sky is the limit!
”We make sustainable hotel stays easy. At Radisson Hotel Group we care for our guests, our people and our planet and aim to be Net Zero by 2050. The clear actions of the Hotel Sustainability Basics or a full-fledged eco-label make our sustainability engagement visible from the guestroom to meetings & events. With unique solutions such as 100% carbon neutral Radisson Meetings, we help you to meet your sustainability goals. Together we can make a real difference!“
They might even be synergising across cross-functional boundaries - the sky is the limit!
Loki
Active member
Clearly they’ve been flying the holistic Helicopter during the carbon neutral board meetings.This is an extract from an email I got this morning from an airport hotel I booked:
”We make sustainable hotel stays easy. At Radisson Hotel Group we care for our guests, our people and our planet and aim to be Net Zero by 2050. The clear actions of the Hotel Sustainability Basics or a full-fledged eco-label make our sustainability engagement visible from the guestroom to meetings & events. With unique solutions such as 100% carbon neutral Radisson Meetings, we help you to meet your sustainability goals. Together we can make a real difference!“
They might even be synergising across cross-functional boundaries - the sky is the limit!
Loki
Active member
Go into the forests near the exped and chuck some locally sourced moonshine into the diesel tanks of the loggers machinery and hammer potatoes down the exhaust pipes?
Fund a conspiracy theory about palm oil and wipe out the industry?
Just for the record I am no angel, I’ve done my share of expeds in the past. Perhaps I’m reforming my views.
Perhaps in the exped application they could also justify why they think their trip justifies the carbon emissions as well as what they are going to do about it. That should be interesting.
wellyjen
Well-known member
Most of the ones I can think of substitute spending more time, or less distance getting there for the emissions from airliners.
So, explore closer to home, mainland Europe for UK people. Still a lot of cave to find. Reach it by road, train etc. The Matienzo exploration of the last 60 years is an excellent example. Reachable via a long drive across France and N Spain, or a ferry across the Bay of Biscay.
Relocate to the country where you plan to explore. A big upheaval to life, but some people do it. I know folk in China who went out and haven't come back. Also means they can help build the local caving scene to lead the exploration.
Travel slow to a destination a long way away. A literal slow boat to China, if China is your destination. This has been done for other places in the past. Overland travel to the Ghar Parau expeditions in Iran and the British expedition to Ethiopia in the early 1970's. Both before air travel plummeted in price and there were sufficient numbers of cavers able to dedicate months on end to an expedition.
The combination that is going to be tricky, if reducing CO2 is a priority is attending an expedition a long way off for a relatively short time, weeks, not months. Flying is the only way to make mixture work. The demands of work, or other commitments in the UK that limit time away will mean choices need to be made, or future heavy green taxes on air travel make the choice for you. Cheap long haul air travel has only been around for a few decades. Probably a blip in the longer term.
Unfortunately it is now quite hard to get far from Europe by land in anything resembling safety. We drove through Saudi, Jordan and Syria a while back whilst going to the UK and it is hard to recommend now. The Stans are not good news either, and I fear we are no longer wildly popular in Russia. The whole of the Sahel is quite tetchy too.
The way is shut.
The way is shut.
wellyjen
Well-known member
You are right. Our freedom of movement over the ground is very restricted once you leave Europe. The sort of overland trips to Iran and Ethiopia that were done in the 1970's would be a very bad idea now. Some of that is down to the wars to get the oil to fuel the airliners that overland travel is a way of avoiding using!
Pony
Active member
Regarding one of the posts about planting on arable land, two years ago the UK was down by an averaged total 900 000 tonnes in wheat alone due to rewilding,set aside schemes and the like . Throw in the Ukraine war, prices rise and an ever growing segment of the population simply cannot afford such options as buying local etc. Plant trees where crops don't grow, steep,thin,rocky highland soils like the forestry commission used to. That said, imagine the uproar if Ingleborough was to become a plantation. At least the caves would grow bigger, faster.
Rob
Well-known member
... and release more carbon in the process?!? 😳
Pony
Active member
Well that's it really. Carbon offsetting is just kicking the can down the road. Take the issue of microplastic. The public opinion is to use paper straws to reduce plastic pollution. They're heavier and use 7 times more energy to produce, so we end up boiling the planet a little quicker. If people could be arsed to lift their drink another three or four inches to their mouths, there'd be no problem.
