A Canadian company called ERA Carbon Offsets Ltd is looking to sell carbon offsets from REDD projects. The company already sells carbon offsets to Shell, which Shell uses to ensure that it can continue drilling for oil. According to the press release below, the president and CEO of the World Wildlife Fund, Carter Roberts supports this.
ERA Carbon Offsets Ltd.
TSX VENTURE: ESR
Oct 03, 2008 09:00 ET
ERA Carbon Offsets Product Update
VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA–(Marketwire – Oct. 3, 2008) – ERA Carbon Offsets Ltd. (TSX VENTURE:ESR) (“the Company”) – Over the past four years, ERA has successfully developed and sold carbon offsets generated through its Community Ecosystem Restoration Projects in the Lower Fraser Valley. These offsets have been sold to a range of companies and organizations, large (e.g. Shell) and small (The Steve Nash Event organizers). ERA continues to develop this EcoNeutral® product, for existing and future customers in the voluntary market.
In addition, and in response to the quickly evolving international carbon marketplace, ERA is developing a unique product that bundles forest-conservation based offsets, or “REDDs”, with the restoration-based carbon offsets. REDDs refer to “reduced emissions from deforestation and land degradation”. This “hybrid” product is unique to the carbon marketplace and indicates very favourable economics, given the ongoing annual income stream from REDD offset sales, which are augmented annually with reforestation offset revenues that grow each year.
REDD projects and carbon products represent a growing focus for carbon brokers, funds, and re-sellers, as international environmental and humanitarian organizations demonstrate growing support for forest conservation-based carbon offsets.
This market development was clearly demonstrated at an “Avoided Deforestation Partners” event held at the Yale Club in New York city on September 22, 2008, where Nobel Laureates Al Gore and Wangari Maathai, as well as Carter Roberts, the president and CEO of World Wildlife Fund, publicly stated their support for such programming with respect to developing U.S. climate legislation. Mr. Roberts’ comments, which essentially reverse the positions of green organizations attending the Conference of Parties in Kyoto in 1997, were supported by senior representatives of a broad range of environmental and humanitarian organizations, as well as the Union of Concerned Scientists, and ERA representatives who were invited to participate.
Mr. Gore’s comments were echoed by a “call to action”, recognizing that “emissions from deforestation are doing more to deepen the climate crisis than all of the world’s cars, trucks, planes, and ships combined.”
ERA is currently investigating and developing potential REDD opportunities with governments and other landowners in Canada, South America, Africa, and Hawaii. At the same time, ERA’s EcoNeutral® carbon offset programming and marketing will continue to address current and anticipated demands in the voluntary markets.
ON BEHALF OF ERA CARBON OFFSETS LTD.:
Robert Falls, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer
ERA Ecosystem Restoration Associates Inc.
ERA is a Canadian based pioneer in forest-based carbon offset programs and project development. Through these initiatives, ERA produces significant, measurable carbon sequestration benefits that are validated and verified to world standard and sold to purchasers interested in offsetting their greenhouse gas footprints as a means of mitigating the effects of climate change. ERA is producing EcoNeutral® offsets from the company’s “Community Ecosystem Restoration Program” in the Lower Fraser Valley, near Vancouver, British Columbia. The project began in February of 2006 with the signing of an Agreement between ERA and the District of Maple Ridge. To date, ERA has generated over 500,000 tonnes of validated and verified EcoNeutral® carbon offsets from the ecosystem restoration project to supply the voluntary carbon offset market. ERA clients include; Rolling Stone Magazine, Shell Canada Ltd, and The Globe Foundation.
“This news release may contain forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements address future events and conditions and therefore involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from those currently anticipated in such statements.”
“The TSX Venture Exchange does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.”
For more information, please contact
ERA Carbon Offsets Ltd.
Alex Langer
Investor Relations
(604) 646-0400
Email: alex.langer@econeutral.com