The Free Democratic Party (FDP) in Germany proposes to issue a new cryptocurrency called Arbil to anyone who removes CO2 or other greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.
Get paid to withdraw CO2 from the atmosphere
In a report by local news daily Welt on Sept. 2, the FDP recognizes that it is no longer enough to focus only on putting less CO2 into the atmosphere. It states that, if the world wants to slow down global warming, it will also need to bring back greenhouse gases that have already been emitted into the atmosphere.
The party in the German Bundestag has now proposed to create a new digital currency with the motto “Put CO2 on the digital chain.”
Marco Buschmann, the First Parliamentary Director of the FDP parliamentary group, said that the project sounds technically complex at first, but is actually quite simple. He added:
“Anyone who withdraws CO2 from the atmosphere will be paid for it. In this way, we want to reward active climate protection and promote inventiveness and innovation.”
The Arbil coin could be valued around $30
Arbil will receive its value by the guarantee to exchange Arbil Coins for emission certificates. One Arbil coin would correspond to the certificate value for one ton of CO2, which is currently valued around $30. Frank Sitta, Deputy Group Chairman of the FDP, said:
“We want to give CO2 a price worldwide. With our blockchain concept, the national emissions trading systems can be elegantly combined.”
When read backwards, Arbil — which is based on “arbor,” the Latin word for tree — spells Libra, the name of Facebook’s cryptocurrency.
Crypto-incentivized climate action
In May, the United Nations signed a memorandum of understanding with nonprofit organization W-Foundation to promote global climate action projects, including compensating those who take climate action with cryptocurrencies.
