Shell to spend $450m on carbon offsetting as fears grow that credits may be worthless

British multinational to spend huge sums on schemes that do not bring genuine carbon reductions, analysis shows

• More than 90% of rainforest carbon offsets by biggest provider are ‘worthless’
• Greenwashing or a net zero necessity? Scientists on carbon offsetting
• Carbon offsets flawed but we are in a climate emergency

The fossil fuel firm Shell has set aside more than $450m (£367m) to invest in carbon offsetting projects, and plans to buy the equivalent of half the current market for nature offsets every year, the Guardian can reveal.

But a joint investigation by the Guardian, Die Zeit and Source Material into Verra, the world’s leading carbon standard for the rapidly growing $2bn voluntary offsets market, has found, based on analysis of a significant percentage of the projects, that more than 90% of their rainforest offset credits – among the most commonly used by companies – are likely to be “phantom credits” and do not represent genuine carbon reductions.