In late June, the US House of Representatives passed HR2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009. Among other provisions, the bill would create a cap and trade system for the US, thereby legitimizing the role of carbon offsets in how our country will deal with climate change concerns. Since the bill passed the House, the climate debate has been pretty quiet, as it has been overshadowed by concerns over the economy and health care. However, when attention again turns to energy and climate, the provisions of this bill will be the starting point for debate.

In anticipation of the pivotal role of offsets in federal policy, the science and business infrastructure of offsets continues to mature. For example, the Climate Action Reserve, which has grown out of California's efforts to establish its own green house gas regulations, has established consensus protocols that will govern the producing of offsets from forests, landfills, and livestock. This organization will be adding protocols for coal mine methane, ozone depleting substances, and other potential offset sources within the next few months.

These protocols, and the legitimacy they establish, will likely take on even more importance as we continue to gain understanding of the important climatic role of greenhouse gases other than CO2. An article in the June issue of in New Scientist describes the new understanding that, at least in the near term, it is probably more cost effective, and climatically important, to address excess releases of methane into the atmosphere than CO2. The reason for this is that methane exerts more warming effect in its first 5 years of being released than 100 times the same weight of CO2. So, if the driving force behind greenhouse gas regulations is climatic change, then we need to place more focus on methane. And the principle way to deal with methane emissions is through offsets. This is because many CO2 releases can be reduced through cost-justified efficiency improvements. But most methane releases, like landfills, livestock, and coal mines, can only be reduced by projects developed according to strict, quality protocols, and funded by revenues from offset sales since most methane reduction projects only add cost, not dollar savings, to the underlying enterprise.

Offsets will play an increasing role in managing greenhouse gases. The more our aviation community understands offsets and includes them in our environmental management strategies, the less it will cost us and the less environmental concerns will drive our ability to fly.