Australia develops carbon-neutral travel concept

An Australian company has developed a program that allows “carbon-neutral” traveling. Greenfleet’s program allows people to pay for trees to be planted to compensate for the carbon emissions that result from their travel.

For $40, Greenfleet, a non-profit environmental organization, plants 17 native trees on the motorist’s behalf as, when they grow, they will absorb the greenhouse gases that the average car produces in one year.

In addition, the company’s website has an online greenhouse calculator so that air travelers can work out the amount of carbon dioxide produced from their one seat on a flight and the number of trees that need to be planted to absorb those greenhouse emissions can then be calculated.

“People are going to fly or drive – of course we can’t stop this. Until technology can come up with more energy efficient modes of transport, one thing we can do is to compensate for the emissions that we do make,” Greenfleet CEO Henry O’Clery said.

Greenfleet has already planted 1.7 million trees across five Australian states, including its largest tree planting project the “Murray Darling Rescue.”

“Our policy is to plant the trees in areas where they’re needed most, from local seed, putting back into the Australian bush what was there originally,” Mr O’Clery said.

Meanwhile, Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore MP this week hosted a seminar on urban forests at Sydney Town Hall, championing a new approach to managing trees in the urban landscape.

A packed hall was addressed by Dr Jane Tarran, Senior Lecturer in Urban Ecology at the University of Technology Sydney and Philip Hewett, Newcastle City Council Urban Forest Strategy and Policy Coordinator.

Ms Moore said that with the massive growth of cities, a “city forests” approach to the greening of cities was needed with a conceptual shift from dealing with our trees on an individual and case by case basis, to managing an urban forest.

“We need to plan for and actively manage our urban trees as a vitally important and scarce natural resource and consider the collective impact of our urban trees,” she said.

“In total the city has about 85,000 trees in its streets and parks across the local government area and council is developing a strategic framework which will provide us with more data about our trees and their health, and address ways to better manage this important resource in order to enhance the environmental and other benefits.

“Raising awareness and educating the community about the importance of trees is desperately needed. Our urban trees are constantly under attack from those who consider urban trees a menace or a source of potential liability.

“Council has already set up a Tree Management Policy, with a Tree Preservation Order, a Street Masterplan, a Significant Tree Register and also participates in National Tree Day, last year planting more than 2000 trees in selected City parks.”

Dr Tarran addressed the seminar on the Benefits to People and their Cities on Well Managed Urban Vegetation ranging from the aesthetic and ecological to the economic and psychological.

Mr Hewett gave examples about how to set and achieve urban forest densities and examined other practical issues in implementing urban forest planning strategies.

By Christine Khan

SYDNEY (eTurboNews)

March 24, 2005   Posted in: Australia