Comment Log Display

As a California resident, I am writing to urge you not to endorse
the California Tropical Forest Standard, and to ensure that these
tropical forest offsets never are accepted into California's carbon
trading system, or adopted by out-of-state entities like the
International Commercial Aviation Organization (ICAO).

Carbon offsets allow big emitters in California to keep polluting,
instead of reducing their carbon footprint. They perpetuate
pollution hotspots and prevent California from taking real action
on climate change. If the ICAO were to adopt tropical forest
offsets, it would allow airline emissions to continue growing while
putting tropical forests into the market over the protests of local
communities. It would perpetuate pollution in California, while
stealing lands - often through force and fraud - from Indigenous
People and other rural communities in places like Brazil and
Indonesia. This would be totally unacceptable.

Tropical forest carbon offsets lack integrity, pose unacceptably
high risks of violating indigenous and human rights, and are
impossible to police across national borders. California should not
be encouraging them through the endorsement of the TFS.