AfB Climate Protection Certificates - More than Compensation

The more CO₂ is emitted, the more damaging it is for our climate. In the Paris Agreement of 2015, it was agreed that global warming should be kept significantly below 2°C. For effective climate protection, it is therefore important to avoid emissions in general or to reduce them as far as possible, e.g. by switching to low-CO₂ mobility. Only then can compensation be considered for the remaining emissions. Here, unavoidable emissions can be offset by CO₂ savings in another climate protection project. This compensation takes the form of so-called emission reduction credits, i.e. certificates, as in the AfB climate protection project.

Climate protection projects are additional climate protection measures, the German Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt) also emphasises.

The concept of the circular economy describes a model for the production and consumption of goods. The idea is to share, rent, reuse, refurbish, repair and recycle existing materials and products for as long as possible. The aim is to extend the life cycle of products, i.e. to reduce waste to a minimum. So when a product has reached the end of its life, the materials and resources should remain in the economic cycle as long as possible, be used productively again and again and thus generate further added value.

Source: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/de/headlines/economy/20151201STO05603/kreislaufwirtschaft-definition-und-vorteile

One tonne of CO₂ is equivalent to a round trip from Frankfurt am Main to Lisbon for one person or a trip from Portugal to Turkey in a medium-sized petrol car. To absorb one tonne of CO₂, a beech tree has to grow for 80 years. Source: tagesschau.de

With regard to compliance, transparency and the avoidance of conflicts of interest, it is very important for us to have the calculation of our life cycle assessment at product level (partner: myClimate) and the certification as a carbon offset project carried out by different service providers. On the one hand, Global Climate has a shareholder group of experienced tax advisors with many years of expertise in auditing. On the other hand, it has sustainability experts, scientific expertise through its cooperation with the Pforzheim University of Applied Sciences (Institute for Industrial Ecology), experienced IT programmers and expertise in CO₂ balancing. This ensures that the regularity of CO₂ accounting, certification and register management meet high tax advisor quality standards. Founder Altan Günsoy was awarded the B.A.U.M. Environment and Sustainability Award 2021 in the digitalisation category, among other things for the development of an innovative software that maps a company's complete CO₂ emissions in real time based on financial data and integrated into processes.

According to the German Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt), projects to reduce greenhouse gases must ensure that their reduction, avoidance or storage of emissions is additional. This means that the climate protection project would not have been possible without the additional funding from the CO₂ certificates.

The AfB climate protection project makes it possible to refurbish and remarket IT devices that would not have been worth refurbishing from an economic point of view, but which make an important contribution to reducing CO₂ emissions and saving resources from an ecological and social point of view.

Source: German Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt)

AfB's climate protection project not only supports climate protection measures directly in Germany, but also saves considerable amounts of emissions, raw materials and energy through the reuse and professional recycling of IT devices. In addition, the climate protection project promotes the inclusion of people with disabilities: 45 % of the almost 600 employees are severely disabled.

You can purchase CO₂ certificates directly from us in the AfB online shop. Please note that only Paypal or credit card are accepted as payment methods for direct purchases in the online shop.

If you would like to purchase on account or purchase larger quantities of CO₂, please send us an enquiry via the contact form.

Double counting of emission reductions occurs when a single emission reduction is used more than once to achieve climate change targets. This could be the case, for example, if two emission allowances are issued for the same emission reductions and both are used to achieve climate targets. Another case of double counting would be if both the user of an emission allowance and the country where the emission reductions of the emission allowance have taken place claim the emission reductions in their climate accounts.

Until now, CO₂ emissions were often offset via projects in the Global South, as under the Kyoto Protocol developing and emerging countries had no emission targets of their own and thus double counting could be ruled out. However, this has changed with the expiry of the Kyoto Protocol. Currently, Article 6 of the Paris Agreement (PA) regulates the "mechanism to contribute to the mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions and support sustainable development". However, a set of rules for the implementation of Article 6 has yet to be adopted. Among other things, it states to "enhance public and private sector participation in the implementation of nationally determined contributions" (PA 6.8.b). From PA Article 6.5, it can be deduced that the issue of double counting will affect offset projects in the Global South in the future, as emerging and developing countries now have emission reduction targets of their own - the debate on this is currently taking place. The decisions of the Glasgow Climate Change Conference COP26 are available here.

AfB has dealt intensively with the issue of double counting. The AfB's position on this is that savings achieved from the AfB climate protection project are neither reported directly to the German emissions inventory nor are they recorded by the German Environment Agency in the form of an extrapolation.No current legal basis (as of the 3rd quarter of 2021) could be found that directly transfers CO₂ emission reductions from the climate protection project to the emissions inventory of the Federal Republic of Germany.  There are also other examples of climate protection projects within the EU or Germany (plastics recycling in Romania, MooreFutures, fortomorrow) that offer credible compensation projects.

Source: German Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt)

AfB uses 100% of the income from the climate protection project to achieve the CO₂ reduction. Personnel, marketing and administrative costs are not covered by income from the climate protection certificate. AfB guarantees the success to implement the emission reduction, as the savings are already made "ex post".

The price for a CO₂ certificate for mandatory offsetting was set at 25 euros per tonne in national emissions trading for 2021 and is to be increased annually by a further 5 euros per tonne of CO₂. Currently, we are orienting ourselves to this price, which already includes VAT. The price of CO₂ certificates for voluntary offsetting depends on the provider and the type of climate protection project.

Carbon offset projects can be issued either as a so-called "ex ante" certificate or "ex post" certificate. "Ex ante" means that the certificate is issued before a predicted reduction (e.g. tree planting). "Ex post" means that certificates are issued after a mitigation has actually already been achieved. Therefore, ex-post certificates are particularly recommended for emission reductions.