Your Mark On The World

You can probably offset your entire carbon footprint for just $20 per month per person in your household. The process is easy, and you can simply set up a monthly plan and forget about it, so it takes no time. Here’s one way to do it; I’m sure there are others. Cool Effect is a nonprofit that operates a crowdfunding site at CoolEffect.org for buying carbon offsets. Every project on the site not only offsets carbon but also does additional good. Cool Effect CEO Marisa De Belloy joined me for a conversation about carbon offsets you can watch in the player at the top of this article. She describes climate change as the “issue of our time.” The first step in offsetting your carbon is to determine your impact. The average American emits 16.6 metric tons of carbon per year. If you want to get into the weeds, you can use this calculator or any of the variety of calculators available online. It may be easier to simply guestimate how your footprint compares by weighing things like the size of your home, the car(s) yo