Farting has come up on TreeHugger before, but mainly in relation to cows. We’ve seen garlic used to fight cow farts, and we’ve seen scientists using fumaric acid, and plant derived tannins to do the same. All because of the huge environmental impact of methane emissions from cows. Human flatulence, however, has escaped our notice (at least editorially!) until now. This will all change if Fart Neutral have their way. Working from the self-declared, and hard to disprove, premise that “farts are funny”, fart neutral are offering various carbon offset products to neutralise one person's methane emissions in a year. While the concept may seem a little, well, immature, it does seem that this organization’s intentions are noble:

“Fart Neutral’s goal is to bring attention to global warming in a unique and humorous way. We offer a line of gift cards, t-shirts and other items, each of which comes with a certificate for a 1000 lbs. reduction in greenhouse gases. The 1000 lbs. greenhouse gases reduction not only neutralizes a person’s farts for one year, but it also offsets greenhouse gases created in the actual production of the apparel and gift cards. A purchase from Fart Neutral is truly green from top to bottom.”

Fart Neutral’s offset provider is Live Neutral, a non-profit that works with the Chicago Climate Exchange. Fart Neutral doesn’t just end with offsets, or so they claim, they also encourage customers to visit the Live Neutral site and learn about ways to reduce their impact. Having said that, there is little further information about green living on their own site (though there is some informative data on farts) and the products they are stocking do not appear to have a deeper green element (T-shirts, for example, seem to be made of conventional cotton). While we are not opposed to bringing a bit of humor, however base, to the environmental debate, it would be nice to see a little more joined-up thinking in the way this idea is executed. ::Fart Neutral :: via site visit::

Thirsty for more? Check out these related articles:

• Ocean's 'Poop Machines' Could Help Fight Climate Change
• Phytocapping To Rehabilitate Landfills, Reduce Greenhouse Emissions
• Tropical Forests Better Left Intact As Carbon Sinks Than Converted to Biofuel Plantations
• A Carbon Neutral Futurama

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