Jan. 4, 2008 - Internet retailers can now add a green shipping option to their online shopping carts. The new ShipGreen program enables consumers to offset the carbon emissions from shipping their online orders, TriplePundit reports.

Based on the research of Dr. Cristiano Facanha and Dr. Arpad Horvath, the program employs a finely tuned algorithm to calculate the total carbon emissions from shipping each order. (For more on Facanha's and Horvath's work, read this article we posted in October.) Due to the accuracy of the algorithm, each carbon offset costs an average of just $.29 to $.49.

Retailers paste a code into their website that generates a checkbox customers can select if they would like to participate in the program. The checkbox then connects to the ShipGreen website for processing. Orders are processed and shipped the same as they would be without the green option.