Very nice project! I’m really looking forward to seeing which athletes take the pledge. Congrats and best of luck!
I have a small question: I was surprised to see Atmosfair listed as a recommended charity. They definitely do a good job in the offsetting field, but they are 100x less effective than other charities included like Clean Air Task Force, Coalition for Rainforest Nations or even other unlisted charities like CoolEarth.
I’m curious to learn more about why you decided to include them anyway?
This is a fair point and one I’m not completely firm on myself.
The main reason for including Atmosfair and Burn are because in my experience pro athletes (particularly tennis players who fly almost every week) are particularly aware of their carbon footprint. Carbon offsetting is a relatively easy sell for this audience.
I understand what you mean. Carbon offsetting is something many people is already familiar with and also tangible (direct action). Indirect actions like developing new technologies, including advanced nuclear, or lobbying to influence political solutions, might be the most effective way, but it is less compelling to many people.
I used to offset my carbon footprint as well until recently. It took some time for me to absorb the facts and act consequently. However, I still find the top charities currently recommended by Founders Pledge kind of abstract and “unsexy”. These adjectives might not be considered relevant for advanced effective altruists, but I think the emotional component should not be neglected. This is especially important when talking to other people about it. It is only my own experience and intuition, but the current top charities do not make one feel excited about it and eventually many will not donate anything, while if other charities that perform direct action are mentioned, it could be more compelling.
The compromise I found is CoolEarth. Protecting forests is tangible (direct action) and people generally like the concept of protecting forests and can grasp it instantly. In addition, according to the studies available (see below—unfortunately, I do know of any more updated versions) we are talking about the same order of magnitude when comparing it to the top charities. Therefore, when talking to other people, I usually start talking about CoolEarth and only in cases where I see they are interested in getting deeper I will talk about the other options.
Regarding the 100x effectiveness: * Clean Air Task Force: $0.10-$1/tonne of CO2e. Source: Founders Pledge report 2018 * Coalition for Rainforest Nations: $0.02 - $0.72/tonne of CO2e. Source: Founders Pledge report 2018 * CoolEarth: $0.18-$0.71/tonne of CO2e. Source: GWWC report 2016 (Note: for this figure, both directly and indirectly protected areas are counted)
I find this topic very interesting and would love to hear other opinions and arguments :)
Offsets are at least 15x worse than high impact charity on climate, I recently re-did the numbers on this and even on very conservative assumptions came out with the most effective work of CATF at something like 10 cents/t (https://youtu.be/TCretlmREXk?t=773). This is their best work and certainly they will not always be that cost effective so we can multiply it by 10 to get to USD1 but the best offsets are probably at USD 15 or so (the analysis on BURN by Giving Green mentions that they don’t expect 1 offset to really express 1 t).
So whenever you include offsets in a portfolio of options alongside high impact options, maybe because they are more tangible, one needs to ask “how much more money does this crowd in?” compared to “how much does this crowd out from high impact options? ” Because the impact differential is so large it can quite easily be the case that even a moderate dilution, say a 10% reduction in giving to high impact, leads to a net negative outcome because the additional crowding in of money is not sufficently large.
Apart from that offsets and the surrounding logic of compensation can possibly be quite bad for popularizing the goal of impact maximization, the idea of offsettting is incredibly unambitious compared to what we inspire people to strive for.
For those reasons I think offsets should have no place in a high impact portfolio.
Addendum: I guess one should always take the precise cost effectiveness estimates with a grain of salt, but it is easy to see from basic principles that offsets cannot be cost effective because offsets are always about direct interventions, whereas the world as a whole is spending hundreds of billions on climate and this is spending that can be affected by advocacy.
For offsets to be anywhere near the best advocacy charities, such as CATF and Carbon180, it would need to be true that there is almost nothing that can be done to improve societal resource allocation on climate.
This is deeply implausible because it is one of the most striking facts about climate how poor societal resource allocation is, leaving vast rooms for impact for charities that move the needle so that government budgets are spent more in line with global decarbonization priorities.
Addendum 2:
Just to be clear 15x differential is not my best guess, but a very conservative guess biased towards finding offsets good.
My best guess would be more in the range of high-impact charity focused on accelerating neglected technologies through advocacy is 100x-1000x better, but I know that this sometimes seems like a sales pitch or implausibly large, so the goal of my post was to give a bit more of the mechanics / underlying reasons and a very conservative estimate.
I would also add that we have revised our view on CfRN so that we don’t think these numbers to be the case anymore, though those revisions were for reasons that do not affect the logic on the differential to expect (it is because of a different view on what they were advocating for, not on more pessimism on the potential of advocacy more generally).
Johannes and I have debated this at length before, but I’d like to make a plug for the utility of providing recommendations for offsets, as we do at Giving Green. I agree with Johannes that offsets are likely much less effective in the fight against climate change than donations targeting systemic change, such as moving policy or technology. (Though I’m less confident about putting any numbers on this difference, which feels like an exercise in extreme guesswork.)
That being said, I do think that providing recommendations in the offset space is likely to result in less GHGs emitted. Johannes expressed worry about diverting donations from effective charities to offsets, but in my opinion that’s not a large concern. People who are thinking closely about effectiveness of donations will easily read the suggestions by orgs like Founder’s Pledge and Giving Green, pushing them toward more systemic donation options.
But that being said, there is a huge market for certainty, which is why these offsets exist. When we make recommendations on offsets, we generally shouldn’t be thinking about individuals who are choosing between different charities. Individuals are a tiny fraction of the offset market (~3% of the voluntary market, and 0% of the compliance market)- all the action is from corporations (voluntary market and carbon-priced markets like California), countries (at least under Kyoto, still unclear what role offsets will play in Paris). The offset market was >300 million in 2019, and is poised to grow: see the growing list of companies who made carbon-neutral commitments in the past few year. These companies are never going to donate to teh Clean Air Task Force. They want certainty, and their purchases can be made WAY more effective by improving the offset market. THere is tons of social value here.
Now, back to HIA. Despite my belief that making offset recommendations has social benefit, HIA is targeted at athletes, who should have no requirement to enter the offset market. I do think HIA could improve its climate recommendations by trying actively to push athletes away from the offset market toward more effective charities. But given that offsets are likely to be attractive to people for various reasons, I feel like offering them offset options is likely to crowd in money rather than divert from more effective charities. But agreed this is an empirical question that is tough to answer
But if HIA is going to offer a recommendation for offsets, I would encourage you guys to use the recommendations at Giving Green. In my opinion, the options at Atmosfair have not been properly vetted, though I don’t think this is the forum to pick apart their recommendations.
Finally, at the risk of going down a rabbit hole, one more point. There are a lot of parallels to this offset debate within international development/global health, an area in which EA is much more developed. Within EA communities, most people are quite comfortable with the recommendations from GiveWell, which are all direct-delivery of health services, and therefore things that can be measured with a high level of certainty. (Like offsets!) So why don’t big international development agencies (World Bank, etc) concentrate only on directly delivery of health services? It’s not because they are just stupid. It’s because they think they can have more bang for their buck investing in systemic changes that can’t be well-quantified with an RCT (like institution-building, macroeconomic stability, infrastructure, etc). Kinda like...funding charities that work on climate policy. So I would find it curious if the final consensus from EAs on global health is all about certainty, but in environment it is firmly for less-certain policy interventions. My argument would be that there is a clear place for both.
What is your view on CoolEarth? It is not an advocacy charity but the cost per ton was in past reports similar to the advocacy ones (even if those are conservative estimates).
I liked the approach ′ “how much more money does this crowd in?” compared to “how much does this crowd out from high impact options? ” ’, but in this case, the difference is not as big as with offsetting, so I am not sure what would be the outcome.
Also, is there any report or article where you explain in more details the revision of your view on CfRN?
I haven’t looked into CoolEarth myself, but I think the standard view is that the analysis on the extreme cost effectiveness of this was faulty, based on very optimistic assumptions that are unlikely to be true (indirect protection of forests etc, I believe you could find posts on this searching the Forum) .
We will discuss our findings on REDD in our upcoming report (Q1/21). I discuss it a bit here (last question):
Very nice project! I’m really looking forward to seeing which athletes take the pledge.
Congrats and best of luck!
I have a small question: I was surprised to see Atmosfair listed as a recommended charity.
They definitely do a good job in the offsetting field, but they are 100x less effective than other charities included like Clean Air Task Force, Coalition for Rainforest Nations or even other unlisted charities like CoolEarth.
I’m curious to learn more about why you decided to include them anyway?
This is a fair point and one I’m not completely firm on myself.
The main reason for including Atmosfair and Burn are because in my experience pro athletes (particularly tennis players who fly almost every week) are particularly aware of their carbon footprint. Carbon offsetting is a relatively easy sell for this audience.
Dan Stein at Giving Green has done research on carbon offsetting’s impact, and specifically efficient cook stoves. https://www.givinggreen.earth/post/fuel-efficient-cookstoves
I recommend BURN, as well as Atmosfair’s cookstove program on HIA.
I’m curious, where do you get the 100x less effective figure from?
I understand what you mean. Carbon offsetting is something many people is already familiar with and also tangible (direct action). Indirect actions like developing new technologies, including advanced nuclear, or lobbying to influence political solutions, might be the most effective way, but it is less compelling to many people.
I used to offset my carbon footprint as well until recently. It took some time for me to absorb the facts and act consequently. However, I still find the top charities currently recommended by Founders Pledge kind of abstract and “unsexy”.
These adjectives might not be considered relevant for advanced effective altruists, but I think the emotional component should not be neglected. This is especially important when talking to other people about it.
It is only my own experience and intuition, but the current top charities do not make one feel excited about it and eventually many will not donate anything, while if other charities that perform direct action are mentioned, it could be more compelling.
The compromise I found is CoolEarth. Protecting forests is tangible (direct action) and people generally like the concept of protecting forests and can grasp it instantly. In addition, according to the studies available (see below—unfortunately, I do know of any more updated versions) we are talking about the same order of magnitude when comparing it to the top charities.
Therefore, when talking to other people, I usually start talking about CoolEarth and only in cases where I see they are interested in getting deeper I will talk about the other options.
Regarding the 100x effectiveness:
* Clean Air Task Force: $0.10-$1/tonne of CO2e. Source: Founders Pledge report 2018
* Coalition for Rainforest Nations: $0.02 - $0.72/tonne of CO2e. Source: Founders Pledge report 2018
* CoolEarth: $0.18-$0.71/tonne of CO2e. Source: GWWC report 2016 (Note: for this figure, both directly and indirectly protected areas are counted)
I find this topic very interesting and would love to hear other opinions and arguments :)
Offsets are at least 15x worse than high impact charity on climate, I recently re-did the numbers on this and even on very conservative assumptions came out with the most effective work of CATF at something like 10 cents/t (https://youtu.be/TCretlmREXk?t=773). This is their best work and certainly they will not always be that cost effective so we can multiply it by 10 to get to USD1 but the best offsets are probably at USD 15 or so (the analysis on BURN by Giving Green mentions that they don’t expect 1 offset to really express 1 t).
So whenever you include offsets in a portfolio of options alongside high impact options, maybe because they are more tangible, one needs to ask “how much more money does this crowd in?” compared to “how much does this crowd out from high impact options? ” Because the impact differential is so large it can quite easily be the case that even a moderate dilution, say a 10% reduction in giving to high impact, leads to a net negative outcome because the additional crowding in of money is not sufficently large.
Apart from that offsets and the surrounding logic of compensation can possibly be quite bad for popularizing the goal of impact maximization, the idea of offsettting is incredibly unambitious compared to what we inspire people to strive for.
For those reasons I think offsets should have no place in a high impact portfolio.
Addendum: I guess one should always take the precise cost effectiveness estimates with a grain of salt, but it is easy to see from basic principles that offsets cannot be cost effective because offsets are always about direct interventions, whereas the world as a whole is spending hundreds of billions on climate and this is spending that can be affected by advocacy.
For offsets to be anywhere near the best advocacy charities, such as CATF and Carbon180, it would need to be true that there is almost nothing that can be done to improve societal resource allocation on climate.
This is deeply implausible because it is one of the most striking facts about climate how poor societal resource allocation is, leaving vast rooms for impact for charities that move the needle so that government budgets are spent more in line with global decarbonization priorities.
I discuss this in a lot more detail in our new report on implications of Biden win for high impact philanthropy: https://founderspledge.com/stories/the-implications-of-bidens-victory-for-impact-focused-climate-philanthropy
Addendum 2: Just to be clear 15x differential is not my best guess, but a very conservative guess biased towards finding offsets good. My best guess would be more in the range of high-impact charity focused on accelerating neglected technologies through advocacy is 100x-1000x better, but I know that this sometimes seems like a sales pitch or implausibly large, so the goal of my post was to give a bit more of the mechanics / underlying reasons and a very conservative estimate.
I would also add that we have revised our view on CfRN so that we don’t think these numbers to be the case anymore, though those revisions were for reasons that do not affect the logic on the differential to expect (it is because of a different view on what they were advocating for, not on more pessimism on the potential of advocacy more generally).
Johannes and I have debated this at length before, but I’d like to make a plug for the utility of providing recommendations for offsets, as we do at Giving Green. I agree with Johannes that offsets are likely much less effective in the fight against climate change than donations targeting systemic change, such as moving policy or technology. (Though I’m less confident about putting any numbers on this difference, which feels like an exercise in extreme guesswork.)
That being said, I do think that providing recommendations in the offset space is likely to result in less GHGs emitted. Johannes expressed worry about diverting donations from effective charities to offsets, but in my opinion that’s not a large concern. People who are thinking closely about effectiveness of donations will easily read the suggestions by orgs like Founder’s Pledge and Giving Green, pushing them toward more systemic donation options.
But that being said, there is a huge market for certainty, which is why these offsets exist. When we make recommendations on offsets, we generally shouldn’t be thinking about individuals who are choosing between different charities. Individuals are a tiny fraction of the offset market (~3% of the voluntary market, and 0% of the compliance market)- all the action is from corporations (voluntary market and carbon-priced markets like California), countries (at least under Kyoto, still unclear what role offsets will play in Paris). The offset market was >300 million in 2019, and is poised to grow: see the growing list of companies who made carbon-neutral commitments in the past few year. These companies are never going to donate to teh Clean Air Task Force. They want certainty, and their purchases can be made WAY more effective by improving the offset market. THere is tons of social value here.
Now, back to HIA. Despite my belief that making offset recommendations has social benefit, HIA is targeted at athletes, who should have no requirement to enter the offset market. I do think HIA could improve its climate recommendations by trying actively to push athletes away from the offset market toward more effective charities. But given that offsets are likely to be attractive to people for various reasons, I feel like offering them offset options is likely to crowd in money rather than divert from more effective charities. But agreed this is an empirical question that is tough to answer
But if HIA is going to offer a recommendation for offsets, I would encourage you guys to use the recommendations at Giving Green. In my opinion, the options at Atmosfair have not been properly vetted, though I don’t think this is the forum to pick apart their recommendations.
Finally, at the risk of going down a rabbit hole, one more point. There are a lot of parallels to this offset debate within international development/global health, an area in which EA is much more developed. Within EA communities, most people are quite comfortable with the recommendations from GiveWell, which are all direct-delivery of health services, and therefore things that can be measured with a high level of certainty. (Like offsets!) So why don’t big international development agencies (World Bank, etc) concentrate only on directly delivery of health services? It’s not because they are just stupid. It’s because they think they can have more bang for their buck investing in systemic changes that can’t be well-quantified with an RCT (like institution-building, macroeconomic stability, infrastructure, etc). Kinda like...funding charities that work on climate policy. So I would find it curious if the final consensus from EAs on global health is all about certainty, but in environment it is firmly for less-certain policy interventions. My argument would be that there is a clear place for both.
What is your view on CoolEarth? It is not an advocacy charity but the cost per ton was in past reports similar to the advocacy ones (even if those are conservative estimates).
I liked the approach ′ “how much more money does this crowd in?” compared to “how much does this crowd out from high impact options? ” ’, but in this case, the difference is not as big as with offsetting, so I am not sure what would be the outcome.
Also, is there any report or article where you explain in more details the revision of your view on CfRN?
I haven’t looked into CoolEarth myself, but I think the standard view is that the analysis on the extreme cost effectiveness of this was faulty, based on very optimistic assumptions that are unlikely to be true (indirect protection of forests etc, I believe you could find posts on this searching the Forum) .
We will discuss our findings on REDD in our upcoming report (Q1/21). I discuss it a bit here (last question):