Limosine and LearJet Environmentalists

The Common’s Blog has an interesting post about TourJet America, which is a private aircraft broker for the entertainment industry, pleding a zero emissions policy when it comes to carbon. The new policy appears to be a result of various entertainers who have been hammered over complaints about carbon emissions who then turn around and hope in their limos which wisk them to airports and their waiting private jets.

However, it isn’t that TourJet America is actually going to reduce its acutal emissions to zero, instead it will participate in the nonprofit Carbon Fund. The Carbon Fund fights global warming by supporting renewable sources of energy and reforestation. So, at best what TourJet will have zero net emissions. That is TourJet will emit X amound of carbon, but will also subsidize renewable energy sources and reforestation that will supposedly reduce the amount of carbon by X, thus the net effect is zero carbon emissions.

Also, the Commons Blog is correct to note that TourJets rhetoric about how incorporating such a policy into their business plan is good for business is mostly just rhetoric at this point. We don’t know if TourJet will continue to remain a successful business and if this policy will adversly affect TourJets performance as a business. Still, something to keep an eye on.

FILED UNDER: Climate Change, Economics and Business,
Steve Verdon
About Steve Verdon
Steve has a B.A. in Economics from the University of California, Los Angeles and attended graduate school at The George Washington University, leaving school shortly before staring work on his dissertation when his first child was born. He works in the energy industry and prior to that worked at the Bureau of Labor Statistics in the Division of Price Index and Number Research. He joined the staff at OTB in November 2004.

Comments

  1. DL says:

    Reforestation efforts to reduce CO2 emissions have caused another unintended consequence -stream beds are drying up in many reforested areas interfering with irrigation etc.
    It seeems trees get very thirsty. An average apple tree “drinks” about 40 gal. of water a day.

  2. floyd says:

    some people will buy anything that is neatly packaged ; is long as you don’t light it on fire and ring the doorbell!

  3. odograph says:

    I, as an old chemist, wonder what the fuss is about. Carbon in, carbon out.

    If these guys want to fund some forests, that’s all good. It certainly puts them ahead (in a strict chemical sense) of the companies who don’t fund carbon incarceration.