If You Drive a Porsche, You Might Also Be Saving the Planet...

homeforsummer
I'd agree. Planting trees isn't a good carbon offset at all, not least because we're chopping the damn things down at a rate far greater than we're sticking saplings in the ground.
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They don't stay saplings for very long. I agree that "we" are chopping them down quickly and that when "we" put them up we're not offesetting the chop-down rate. But it's not the same "we". They're going to get chopped down regardless. It's better to put them up than to not right?

homeforsummer
Well there's more to it than just CO2 for a start... though offsetting 3.7 tons of CO2 for 10k miles in a 911 (at circa 190g/km) is a big ask on its own. CO2 isn't the only tailpipe emission though, and I'm guessing this program won't offset Porsche's emissions as a company to any great degree.
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I think it's fair to take them to task over how it's calculated. But also keep in mind that you might be talking about someone who was going to buy a car anyway. If you know you're going to buy a car, then some of that is sunk no matter what.

homeforsummer
I'll bite with wind turbines though: One would have to question the motivation of erecting a wind turbine whose "carbon credits" are going towards offsetting someone's sports car, rather than erecting a wind turbine where 100% of its output is offsetting existing energy generation. If some of that turbine's energy is solely going towards ensuring some dude in a 911 can feel better about themselves, then it's energy wasted on not doing something more productive.
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Not sure exactly what you mean here but I think you mean that spending money on a wind turbine without also buying a 911 is better from an environmental perspective than spending money on a wind turbine and buying a 911. And while that's true, spending on a wind turbine because you bought a 911 is better than not spending on a wind turbine and buying a 911. Right?
 
Danoff
They don't stay saplings for very long. I agree that "we" are chopping them down quickly and that when "we" put them up we're not offesetting the chop-down rate. But it's not the same "we". They're going to get chopped down regardless. It's better to put them up than to not right?

I think it's fair to take them to task over how it's calculated. But also keep in mind that you might be talking about someone who was going to buy a car anyway. If you know you're going to buy a car, then some of that is sunk no matter what.

Not sure exactly what you mean here but I think you mean that spending money on a wind turbine without also buying a 911 is better from an environmental perspective than spending money on a wind turbine and buying a 911. And while that's true, spending on a wind turbine because you bought a 911 is better than not spending on a wind turbine and buying a 911. Right?
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No argument over any of that. To be clear, yes to more trees, yes that offsetting is better than doing nothing at all, and yes that if buying something (cars, homes, whatever) with a high environmental impact is inevitable then attempting to mitigate that with clean energy is at least a good start.

The gist though is that Porsche owners won't suddenly be saving the planet by spending a few hundred bucks to offset driving around in said Porsche. Becoming a "sustainable" company would be a more admirable pursuit if Porsche hadn't literally the other week revealed the latest addition to its ever-growing SUV range...
 

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