Some Shanghai white-collar workers have embraced a new travel concept that involves planting trees to compensate for emissions incurred during vacations.

The idea emerged from a small circle of netizens who love both nature and vacationing, the Shanghai Morning Post reported.

Their logic says that people on vacation often take modern transportation which emits carbon dioxide, so travelers can plant trees at the end of their trips to mitigate their "wrongdoings" towards nature.

By downloading a small calculator from the group's Web forum, one could get a rough idea of how many trees they should plant to repay their "debt."

An economy-class seat on a 3,000-kilometer flight, for example, produces 417 kilograms of carbon dioxide, according to the calculator. The traveler in this seat would need to plant four trees to consume that amount of gas over a 30-year period.

The Web forum has attracted widespread attention as more and more educated travelers express the desire to travel "emission-free."

Web site's organizers say they hope people will realize that they must contribute to environmental protection through changing details in their lives.

(CRI March 13, 2008)