Carbon Neutral: A Reality or a Concept

One of the latest buzz word, “Carbon Neutral”, is in talks now-a-days due to many developed countries talking and discussing. The term is very sensitive considering the realization of the amount of adverse effects pollution has put in. By now we are all aware that carbon dioxide (CO₂) is the major reason for global warming along with other greenhouse gases like methane. The issue with CO₂ and other greenhouse gases is that they trap in a lot of the heat that gets radiated from the incoming sun rays, which increases the temperature of the earth. Now the presence of these gases are natural, and nature has its ways to regulate them. Like we breathe out CO₂, and plants take it in for their survival, and natural burning of forests causes release of CO₂ while oceans consume some surplus. But human beings have adversely impacted the process of carbon cycling, releasing the carbon trapped in the earth’s crust (in the form of fossil fuels) into the atmosphere. This addition to the amount of CO₂ already present in the atmosphere, results in trapping of extra radiation from the sun, in turn increasing the temperature of the Earth. Increase in the temperature of earth results in melting of ice and increase in sea levels, and many disastrous situations. So this calls in for controlling the carbon addition to the environment or adopting carbon neutral steps.

Carbon neutral is both a reality and a concept! Reality in sense that we stop producing carbon emissions altogether, and carbon offsetting option is the conceptual aspect. Now we understand the reality approach well, but the carbon offsetting has some catch, it is a method by which we neutralize the amount of carbon we produce. I.e. suppose we burn some coal in the power plant, we plant some trees in the nearby area or somewhere else in the world to neutralize the warming effect that were to be caused by the power plant’s operation. But this carbon offsetting requires very strict regulations, as companies might get to play with its loopholes, for instance a company based out of U.S can claim to do plantation activity in Africa, meanwhile Africa can show that it has so much of forest cover and leverage its carbon emissions. Even this approach can add to ecological imbalances resulting from more forest cover at one place and none at other. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a body of the UNs, claims that if we want to limit the increase in global average temperature by 1.5°C from pre-industrial times, then the world needs to soon cut down carbon emissions. As shown in the figure below, if we can cut emissions to 1/3^rd of current level by 2050, the rise in temperature can be stabilized and then further reduction can help reduce it; this gives nature the time to heal!      

So in my opinion carbon neutrality should include all possible greenhouse emissions to be in check and strict regulations should be enforced, including direct emission cuts. More nations should come along on initiatives like the Paris Agreement and pledge on investing in collaborative research projects that can develop sustainable renewable resource utilization. Specially developed nations need to regulate carbon emissions first, as they have the resources to do so in comparison to developing nations, where substituting energy requirements to green energy will take some time and disruptive scientific innovations. Economy needs to go hand-in-hand with ecology, if we know till date, mother Earth is the only place life exists naturally!

Image Reference: Rogelj J. et al. “Net-zero emissions targets are vague: three ways to fix.” Nature Comment, (Volume 591) PP: 365-368 (2021).