“California’s largest utility promises its customers green salvation through its ClimateSmart program.
For every bit of energy a Pacific Gas & Electric ratepayer uses – from turning on a vacuum cleaner to powering up a computer or heating up an oven – a little part of a tree or forest is saved to erase the carbon sins of the customer. The voluntary program costs participants about $60 a year.
But the company isn’t telling its customers one crucial fact: Those forests were purchased years ago by a Virginia conservation group that used nearly $50 million in loans and grants from California taxpayers. The Conservation Fund then sold PG&E carbon credits on land it had purchased for preservation and selective logging.”
PG&E carbon offsets come from protected forests via Susanne Rust – San Francisco Chronicle