Guilt and the environment

Leave the World a Better Place™ - Carbon Offsetting Option

EcoSkies - Carbon Offsetting OptionContinental has partnered with Sustainable Travel International (STI), a non-profit organization that supports global climate protection and environmental conservation. STI offers customers the option to make a contribution to offset their carbon footprints for travel on Continental. All contributions are paid directly to STI. Continental does not receive any portion of any contribution.

Sustainable Travel International calculates that to offset your amount of CO2 from this itinerary, you may contribute $0.21 or another amount.

I just make an airline booking and noticed the above paragraph just after the booking details. Very interesting concept I must say - to make the guilt disappear.

But, another though that comes to mind is that the carbon impact of a 4 hour flight seems to be worth only $0.21, a miniscule atom amount. So, will this achieve the proper purpose of assuaging guilt? What if someone thinks “I’ll have a heck of a number of really long flights to do and even then my impact cannot exceed $10”.Therefore, I do not care.

Did I contribute the amount? No. I’ll turn off the light bulbs when I leave a room.