Wearing my Liberal International hat – next Tuesday 14th May at 3pm UK time, I’ll be moderating a webinar with Dr Delton Chen of Carbon Global Initiative and Tom Athanasiou of EcoEquity, both cited authorities in the novel The Ministry for the Future.

They’ll be dialing in from California and Australia, so every reason for my friends around the world to be joining as well!

We’ll be discussing Treasury and central bank policies around discount rates and carbon currencies to decarbonise our futures.

Join us! https://liberal-international.org/climate_economy_solutions/

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Post-talk takeaways:

Objective: To complement existing initiatives to mobilise the several trillion dollars required to reduce and remove atmospheric GHGs to keep us within a 1.5 degree C world. 

The proposal:  

• For every ton of carbon removed, avoided or reduced that is certified by a UN public body to be real for 100y, the entity doing the right thing gets a carbon coin. 
• They can trade that coin immediately for any other currency on the currency exchanges, so one carbon coin would be worth a certain amount of other fiat currencies. 
• Central banks would guarantee it at a certain minimum price.  

Difference from what’s been done before: There is no offset. (On the supply side, the entity reducing emissions gets rewarded for it. But on the demand side, there is no buying entity that gets to claim they’re doing good and gets rewarded by being able to claim a reduction in their own carbon footprint.)

Why this would work where offsets have fallen short: We need a global regulatory authority to certify the emissions reductions. Salaried technocrats will be guarded from KPIs to approve as many units as possible, but will also be motivated to approve units in a timely manner. 

What’s needed to make this a reality: Political will. Liberal International can serve to mobilise political will in 120 countries, and bring this to the UN General Assembly.