After the screening TerraPass CEO Tom Arnold (not to be confused with Roseanne Barr’s former husband) hosted a reception down the street at Trellis restaurant. TerraPass is a new startup that lets you buy carbon offsets for your car. TerraPass lets you calculate the amount of carbon your car emits and then you pay TerraPass a fee which they invest clean energy product (how it works). Tom and TerraPass are subjects of a front page New York Times story today (free registration required):
Web sites like terrapass.com, carbonfund.org, nativeenergy.com and self.org focus on automobile emissions because drivers can become aware of their carbon footprint every time they fill up. An average car produces about 10,000 pounds of carbon dioxide a year.
Tom Arnold, one of the founders of Terrapass, a carbon-offset seller that, unlike most others, actually intends to make a profit, said that just as in the dawn of recycling a generation ago, the idea of carbon offsetting is being embraced at first by "greenies" who already plant trees, eat organic foods and buy fuel-efficient cars. As these environmentalists accept the altruistic good of doing something for the planet that will not immediately benefit them, they hope to spread the ideal of living a "carbon-neutral" life to nonbelievers.
I purchased my TerraPass at the Green Expo in San Francisco in the
fall, feeling just slightly self-satisfied as a result of putting the
decal on my Prius. (more on Prius Smugness shortly.) Join me on my ego trip.
Seen at the reception: Sanjay Wagle, Global Mindshift‘s
Roberto Miller, Yahoo’s Kent Brewster and his wife Vickie; Clea
Sarnquist; Teddy Zmrhal; Anna Halpern-Lande; John Merrells; and Kevin
Bell. Email me with omissions.