Crypto AM shines its Spotlight on The Universal Protocol Alliance
Climate change is undoubtedly becoming one of the most dominant issues that we as humans are unanimously facing across the globe (perhaps only second to the pandemic) The world emits about 43 billion tonnes of CO2 a year and pretty much everything we buy as consumers has a carbon footprint.
Carbon Credits were introduced in 1997 in an attempt to reduce carbon emissions made by large corporations and began to be traded as a non-deliverable commodity on OTC markets. However, according to the World Bank, in 2020, humanity compensates for just 22% of global emissions through the purchase and retirement of carbon credits, and yet the proportion of countries operating regulated carbon markets has risen from 40 percent of global GDP in 2016 to 70 per cent in 2021 . The result is a wall of demand that may far outstrip the production of new carbon credits, which is choked by the slow and expensive process of Regulated Carbon Project certification as well as no single global clearing price for carbon emissions.
But fear not! The Universal Protocol Alliance (UP Alliance) has had enough and introduced the world’s first public blockchain tradable carbon token UPCO2 – ready to be bought and held as an investment, or burnt to offset an individual’s carbon footprint in 195 countries!
Voluntary carbon credits, which back all UPCO2 Tokens, offer major economic advantages compared with regulated credits. As dollar-denominated, globally-recognized, fungible and perennial assets, voluntary credits last forever, maintaining option value, until consumed or retired by a company or burned by an individual seeking to compensate for the carbon footprint.
Each UPCO2 Token represents one year-tonne of CO2 pollution averted by a certified REDD+ project preventing rainforest loss or degradation. Every Token is backed by a Voluntary Carbon Unit [VCU], a digital certificate issued by Verra, the international standards agency, which allows certified projects to turn their greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions into tradable carbon credits.
‘Combating climate change is likely to become the dominant economic issue of the next 20 years, said JP Thieriot, Co-Founder of the UP Alliance and CEO of Uphold. The UPCO2 Token allows people everywhere to participate in this hugely important – and potentially lucrative – new market, as well as do the right thing for the planet.’
‘The projects we support through carbon credit purchases prevent deforestation in the Amazon, Congo Basin and Indonesia as well as other threatened rainforests,’ explained UP Alliance Chairman, Matthew Le Merle. ‘For a new generation of investors looking for more than mere financial return, UPCO2 offers attractive social, economic and environmental benefits. At a key moment for climate change, UPCO2 allows people worldwide to do good for the planet and potentially do well for themselves.’
Matthew continued: ‘We believe that the UPCO2 token has an important role to play in democratizing access to carbon credits, which could eliminate price arbitrage and produce a single global price. This was a light bulb going on for me. Combine a digital asset with a rainforest carbon offset and give everyone in the world access. How could that not be a great idea?’
It seems to us to be a very timely and very well executed idea. My main thought would be why has this use case for tokenization taken so long?
Universal Protocol Alliance’s vision is that every asset class will be digitized and tokenized. We are an alliance of like-minded cryptocurrency companies and blockchain pioneers including Bittrex Global, CertiK, Fifth Era, Hard Yaka, Infinigold, Ledger, and Uphold. We know how to tokenize and transparently substantiate any asset.
Learn more at www.universalprotocol.io and purchase UPCO2 at www.uphold.com
