Coffee? Tea? Carbon offset? For the first time ever, air passengers will be able to offset their travel during a flight as Virgin Atlantic introduced a Gold Standard Carbon Offset Scheme this week.

The airline has partnered with myclimate to offer the scheme which is now available onboard and online, and will benefit projects in Indonesia and India including developing a power plant which turns farming waste like sugar cane husks into electricity for the local community.

Endorsed by 49 Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) worldwide including many environmental groups, Gold Standard credits are independently validated and only support renewable energy or energy efficiency technologies (no tree planting or gas flaring).

Virgin Atlantic has also calculated exactly how much carbon is produced for each of its flights and had this verified through Greenhouse gas verification company, CICS. The airline then calculated how much this would equate to for each passenger by taking into account the different weights of equipment and seats in each class of travel, and also the amount of cargo on each route. So Upper Class passengers pay more than Economy passengers because their seat and Inflight Entertainment monitors are significantly heavier.

Sir Richard Branson, President of Virgin Atlantic commented: "Virgin Atlantic is offering the world’s first ever scheme enabling passengers to offset their air travel during their flight. This effective carbon offsetting option is unique as it supports only Gold Standard projects. We hope our passengers will be keen to become members of our Gold Standard Mile High Offset Club!"

In addition to buying offsets onboard, passengers can buy carbon offsets for their flights on the airline website when they book their tickets or any time they choose.

Earlier in the year Sir Richard Branson also announced that all profits from Virgin travel companies over the next ten years, around $3billion, will be invested into schemes that will fight climate change - such as the Virgin Fuels, a green fuel research arm of the company which will trial the use of bio-jet fuel in Virgin aircraft in 2008.