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The market for carbon offsets isn't really regulated and the partner registries aren't accountable to anyone nor does anything prevent you from making one yourself. Needless to say they aren't exactly what you'd call reliable. Half the time you're paying someone with a golf course to not chop down trees that they weren't going to remove anyway.

There is a fundamental conflict of interest with this as most corporations are trying to buy as many offsets for as little of an investment as possible to present themselves as net zero, so whoever is good at marketing and manages to provide a better (and likely impossible) ratio of offset/pay will get most business. As such it's a feedback loop that rewards competent scammers and cuts out fair parties for being uncompetitive.

Without proof that you can see for yourself as to where the funding is used and what the actual physical results are I wouldn't trust anything. Perhaps that's something that OP can provide.



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