In the interest of Awareness, here’s our quick roundup of some Earth Day links and other environmentally topical reading:

Earth Day Canada has a handy guide to Earth Day events across Canada. Plenty happening today and over the rest of the weekend.

The New York Times on Earth Day as Big Business. The Globe and Mail chimes in with what seems like self-parody: “Four stock picks for Earth Day.” Really.

Carbon offsets are a scam, says the Christian Science Monitor in a new series of articles examining the industry:

They are buying into projects that are never completed, or paying for ones that would have been done anyhow, the investigation found. Their purchases are feeding middlemen and promoters seeking profits from green schemes that range from selling protection for existing trees to the promise of planting new ones that never thrive. In some cases, the offsets have consequences that their purchasers never foresaw, such as erecting windmills that force poor people off their farms.

Carbon offsets are the environmental equivalent of financial derivatives: complex, unregulated, unchecked and—in many cases—not worth their price.

Heather Rogers also calls foul on carbon offset projects in the current issue of The Nation.

Via this Worldchanging blog post, a recent TED Talk by Catherine Mohr about the hard reality of building an environmentally friendly home, eschewing the kind of green sentimentality that fuels carbon offsets and diving deep into the actual data. It’s short, funny, and educational:

Climate fight! University of Victoria Professor Andrew Weaver announced yesterday in a press release that he is suing the National Post for four articles it wrote about him over the past few months. Weaver, the Canada Research Chair in Climate Modelling and Analysis, says the Post “attributed to me statements I never made, accused me of things I never did, and attacked me for views I never held.” The four articles in question are “Weaver’s Web,” “Weaver’s Web II,” “Climate agency going up in flames,” and “So much for pure science.” Suing the Financial Post op-ed page for their ridiculous environmental reporting may seem like suing the sun for shining, but Weaver is one of the country’s top climate scientists, so this bears watching.

Rabble has some suggestions for Earth Day–related things to do on university campuses across Canada.

The David Suzuki Foundation is running a series of book swaps across the country until April 24. If you haven’t read it, it’s new to you — and might save some paper as well.

Finally, Maude Barlow of the Council of Canadians sends a dispatch from Cochabamba, Bolivia, where she’s attending the World People’s Conference on Climate Change and Rights of Mother Earth:

Untapped oilfield or conservational goldmine?

Ecuador’s Yasuni National Park is home to one of the planet’s most richly diverse ecosystems. Beneath it lies enough oil to generate some billions of dollars in revenue.

What’s a poor Andean nation to do? Hold off drilling in exchange for cash, it turns out.

In 2007, Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa proposed a novel solution: the Yasuni oil fields would remain untouched in exchange for economic compensation from wealthier countries around the world. Enter: the carbon market.

Carbon credits are typically granted in response to emissions-reducing initiatives. Ecuador’s unorthodox approach to the program, which would earn the country carbon credits for not bringing forth future emissions in the first place, is a first.

Despite being South America’s fifth-largest oil producer, most Ecuadorians live in poverty. Three decades of oil exportation have resulted in mass deforestation, pollution, and extensive watershed degradation. The proposal to reap economic benefits from conservation, rather than exploitation of resources, is a novel one, yet sure to draw controversy from opponents who see the plan as an ill fit to the requirements of the carbon credit program or, at worst, cash for what might ultimately prove a short-term agreement.

It is also unclear how exactly the money would be spent, or how the certificates would be sold on carbon markets.

Regardless of the potential downfalls, environmentalists view the initiative as an ecologically benevolent sacrifice on the part of the Ecuadorian government.

Let’s hope they’re right.