Go Zero® is administered by The Conservation Fund. Effective and efficient, we are consistently recognized as one of the nation's top environmental charities by two watchdog organizations: American Institute of Philanthropy and Charity Navigator.
Your charitable contribution of approximately $10.50 per tree ($8.80 per short ton of carbon dioxide) supports The Fund's efforts to restore native forests that will reduce the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, protect wildlife habitat and enhance America's public recreation areas.
Go Zero donations are used to acquire land on behalf of national and state parks or wildlife refuges, restore that land with native trees, and to measure, monitor and validate the amount of carbon dioxide that will be captured and stored in those trees over their lifetime (estimated at 100 years).
The process of collecting carbon in forests, soils, geological formations and other carbon "sinks" is called carbon sequestration. Native trees and forests help fight climate change as part of their natural processes. As they grow, trees absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and convert it into oxygen. In addition to trapping the gases that cause climate change, these new forests filter the water we drink, restore habitat for wildlife and enhance public recreation areas.
The majority of these trees are planted and monitored by Environmental-Synergy Inc., a company led by scientists specializing in reforestation and carbon sequestration planting and monitoring. We also work with state foresters and professional tree planters at select sites. Go Zero trees may be planted by volunteers for ceremonial purposes only.
Go Zero works primarily with state and federal public land agencies, including the US Fish and Wildlife Service. These government agencies are the long-term land managers and stewards of the Go Zero trees and employ some of the world's top biologists and environmental professionals. Our public agency partners provide written verification of each planting and are responsible for monitoring and stewardship of the land once it is restored.
The Fund pools Go Zero donations, and completes one or two major restoration projects each year. Your trees are typically planted as part of the first project after your donation.
For the past several years, The Conservation Fund's reforestation efforts have been focused on the Red River and Lower Mississippi River valleys. Habitat loss is more pronounced here than in any other area of the United States—more than 24 million acres of bottomland hardwood forests have been cleared over the course of the last century. Restoring these lands are top priorities for The Conservation Fund and the US Fish and Wildlife Service.
We're working with the US Fish and Wildlife Service to buy and restore +/-1,180 acres of marginal farmland within the boundary of the Red River National Wildlife Refuge located in Natchitoches Parish in northern Louisiana. Using donations from Go Zero, The Fund will restore the entire acreage to its native bottomland hardwood forest habitat in two phases beginning in January of 2009. Once restored, the land will be conveyed to the Service as an addition to the Red River National Wildlife Refuge for permanent protection and long-term stewardship.
Beginning in January of 2009, The Fund is working with Scientific Certification Systems, an accredited independent standards auditing firm, to validate its Red River Restoration Initiative against the Climate, Community and Biodiversity Alliance (CCBA) standard. Download a copy of The Fund's CCBA application for Red River to learn more.
Sequestration rates are based on scientific research conducted by third party expert organizations including Winrock International, Environmental Synergy, Inc. and the US Fish and Wildlife Service and vary depending on tree species and geographic location. Go Zero calculations assume average sequestration rates per acre of land reforested and always include appropriate tree survival assumptions.
For example, in the Lower Mississippi River Valley, where most of The Fund's sequestration efforts have been focused, The Fund and its partners plant approximately 302 trees per acre, which will sequester approximately 361 tons of carbon dioxide over 100 years. Therefore, on a per planted tree basis, each tree absorbs an average of approximately 1 to 1.2 tons of carbon dioxide over its lifetime.
Absolutely. But it takes time. While there is no silver bullet to this issue, reforesting once-forested but currently unproductive areas such as marginal agricultural lands is a recognized and proven way to sequester carbon dioxide.
Estimates are that as much as 50% of the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide over the last 50 years may be due to the effects of land use change. Furthermore, the World Bank estimates that 20 percent of global greenhouse gas emission is caused by deforestation. Thus, restoring forestland represents a natural way to reverse these effects and combat climate change.
According to the Pew Center on Global Climate Change climate change policies should include storage of carbon dioxide in U.S. forests."Climate change is the major global environmental challenge of our time and in order to deal with it in the most cost-effective way, we need to consider the full range of solutions—and that includes carbon storage in forests," said Eileen Claussen, President of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. "If we ignore the potential for forest-based sequestration, any projection of the costs and feasibility of addressing climate change is going to be overly pessimistic and wrong."
Given the scale of the effort required to tackle climate change, we need to pursue new technologies that help us reduce our footprint and at the same time, recognize and use the tools we have at our fingertips. As long as forestry-based carbon offsets meet strict criteria to ensure their environmental integrity, they offer an inexpensive way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while at the same time providing an incentive for ancillary benefits.
The Go Zero program was created as a philanthropic approach to offsetting the annual carbon dioxide emitted by a specific activity, business, organization or individual. Therefore, all earned "carbon credits" or "carbon offsets" are retired by The Fund and cannot be banked for future offset purposes or sold.
For those parties interested in marketable or tradable carbon credits, contact John Rogers, or read more about The Fund's work with the private sector to facilitate carbon offset projects via afforestation.
The Conservation Fund has been a leader in carbon sequestration through reforestation since 2000, adhering to the most rigorous environmental and scientific principles. Our carbon sequestration programs, including but not limited to Go Zero, have restored more than 20,000 acres and planted six million trees. Over their lifetime, these new forests will capture an estimated 7.2 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent from the atmosphere.
The Conservation Fund uses calculation methods and standards set forth by The Greenhouse Gas Protocol Initiative (GHG Protocol), which aims to harmonize accounting and reporting standards worldwide to ensure that different trading platforms and other climate related initiatives adopt consistent approaches to GHG accounting.
In terms of its reforestation activities, all Go Zero projects adhere to the following principles:
Native Species: Forest-based carbon sequestration projects are comprised of native trees, designed to restore fully functioning natural systems.
Environmental Benefits: Projects provide additional environmental benefits including restored wildlife habitat, improved air and water quality and enhanced recreation areas.
Permanence: The Fund works with the nation’s leading public natural resource agencies and non-governmental organizations so that trees are planted in permanently protected areas with long-term management plans to ensure accuracy and certainty of carbon sequestration. In addition, up to ten percent of the total anticipated carbon to be captured from a project will be set aside as a buffer, or a reserve, in case of loss. In general, project areas with high risk of loss, such as from fire or drought, will not qualify.
Additionality: Each project establishes a carbon baseline and a defined monitoring system so that GHG removals can be independently verified. Projects result in additional carbon dioxide capture compared to that which would otherwise have occurred.
Leakage: Projects do not displace productive land-use activities nor do they displace emissions to another location. For example, carbon capture and storage activities at our project areas do not lead to the clearing of forestlands elsewhere.
Verification and Validation: At the conclusion of each restoration effort, the natural resource agency steward provides the Fund with written verification of successful planting activities. Beginning in 2009, Go Zero projects are being validated against the standards of the Climate, Community and Biodiversity Alliance.
Yes. To find out how Go Zero can be customized to meet the specific needs of your company or organization, contact Jena Meredith at jmeredith@conservationfund.org.
Go Zero's corporate programs can meet objectives related to the following:
Looking to engage and inspire customers by including Go Zero in an online purchase path or percent-of-sale transaction? Please help us maintain our commitment to efficiency and effectiveness by completing a short, cause-related marketing partnership request form to begin the process.
Plant a Tree, Trap a Ton.
Donate now to help the Fund restore 1,100 acres of forestland in Louisiana’s Red River National Wildlife Refuge.
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Powered by: Phase2 TechnologyThe Conservation Fund National Office
1655 N. Fort Myer Drive, Suite 1300
Arlington, Virginia 22209-2156
Phone: 703-525-6300
Fax: 703-525-4610
Email: postmaster@conservationfund.org
