Banking classes online

CORPORATE CARBON OFFSET

Wetlands and natural systems play a major role in the earth’s carbon cycle. Many carbon banking projects exist to protect and enhance wetland carbon reserve and sequestration, including the protection and restoration of wetland systems, plants and trees. The Swamp School will hone your understanding of carbon exchange and help you determine the best way to invest in carbon sequestration.

What is carbon banking? Carbon banks occur in recognition that an investment has been made in sequestration that compensates or offsets the greenhouse gases being generated by other day-to-day activities. Generally an organization will start by developing an estimate of its “carbon footprint.” This provides an assessment of the total amount of CO2 generated as a result of the organization’s various activities including direct manufacturing as well as indirect activities such as employee commuting. Once the total tonnage of CO2 is determined, a mitigation plan is developed.

The carbon mitigation plan includes a banking instrument. This is a document that describes a project that will be used to offset the CO2 from the organization. This can be done for a specific client or on a larger scale as a bank. The bank describes carbon offset techniques that are used to derive carbon offset credits. These credits can be bought or sold as consumable community credits in various trading markets.

This class is for anyone who needs to get a quick understanding of what Carbon Banking is all about. It is written to specifically address what is carbon banking and how can your company, organization, industry or family become carbon neutral. The class addresses several key topics including:

• Climate change and global warming
• What is the carbon cycle and how does it work
• How do we sequester carbon
• The business of carbon trading
• What is next in carbon futures