Why Not Carbon Negative?

Most of the discussion today on reducing your carbon foot print focuses on trying to live a carbon neutral lifestyle.  I have recently read a little book about John Wesley, who developed a philosophy for his life based on three simple rules: do no harm, do good, and stay in love with God.  I thought about how this applies to reducing my carbon footprint and I decided that maybe stopping at carbon neutral is not good enough.  I certainly agree that living carbon neutral would fit with the "do no harm" rule, but does it go far enough to "do good"?  Maybe we need to strive for carbon negative to "do good" and impact the world in a positive way with our own carbon footprint.  Either way, here are some products and ideas that are carbon negative.

Guyot Designs has two different products that they sell with enough carbon offsets to create a carbon negative product.  You can visit their site here.  The two featured products are a stainless steel reusable water bottle and a set of lightweight camping utensils.  A resusable water bottle is great in so many ways.  If you aren't happy with the quality of tap water in your area, find a good filter.

A UK based suit maker has a new line that comes with enough offsets to cover the manufactering and life of the suit three times.  So, with this product you get enough offsets to offsets two other people's suits as well as your own.  You can visit their site here.  Who said fashion can't be green?

Fiji Water is now promoting a new concept where they are pledging to reduce their carbon footprint by 25% immediately, use 50% renewable energy by 2010, and offset 120% of the remainder of their carbon footprint starting in 2008.  This does two things, it incentivizes the company to make further reductions in their carbon emmissions, which will decrease the expense they incur purchasing offsets, and it gets their customers involved in reducing CO2 emissions when they purchase the products.  You can visit their site here.

Think about your approach to reducing your carbon footprint.  Try to approach it in a way that is both long term and incentivizes you to make further reductions.  Those of us that are concerned can only make an impact on the lives of others by doing more than our fair share.