Welcome to The Carbon Catablog, our in-house blog at Carbon Catalog.

You probably know about global warming. Maybe you even saw Al Gore’s movie. It’s common knowledge that the problem is our energy-intensive way of life. But short of moving back to a cave, what can you do about it?

Carbon offsets claim to balance your contribution to climate change. But is it good enough to pay some money, and continue living as before? What is the point of reducing my carbon footprint when China’s opening a new coal power station every week?

I believe there is a point. Not because a few million well-meaning Westerners are going to change the world overnight. But because it’s the first step towards understanding the cost of what we’re doing - the cost of dumping carbon into the atmosphere.

This cost has been real for decades, but we’ve only just started to notice it. I think now’s the time to start paying, both to cancel the effects of our own emissions, and to promote new technologies which can make a real difference to our future.

But our goal at Carbon Catalog is not to sell you offsets. We don’t make a penny either way. Instead we’re here to help you learn about the options, and then make your own decision. And if you do choose to buy offsets, our objective listings can help you decide where from.

I’m privileged to welcome Karin Kloosterman as writer and editor of The Carbon Catablog. Karin is a regular contributor to TreeHugger, the web’s leading environmental blog. She’ll be posting here to help us make sense of things. I’ll also be chiming in to talk about updates to the site and developments in the carbon market.

Wishing you a healthy and happy 2008,

Gideon