Bitso, a Mexico City-based crypto exchange, is pledging to buy carbon offsets for every bitcoin transaction on its platform to compensate for the cryptocurrency’s environmental toll.
Bitcoin’s thirst for power has grown many times over, recently topping the electricity usage of several countries, including Denmark and Chile, per Cambridge University estimates.
Instead, Bitso is working with Moss.Earth, a São Paulo, Brazil-based carbon offsets company, to indirectly mitigate the emissions associated with transacting bitcoin and Ethereum-based tokens via its platform.
However, last year a Guardian and Unearthed investigation found that Vera’s methodologies were “not currently robust enough” — Vera sharply criticized the report.
There are a wide range of estimates that try to pin down the exact emissions tied to a single bitcoin transaction, and some are far greater than Moss and Bitso’s, but that’s beyond the scope of this story.
With more than 4 million users, Bitso calls itself the most popular and largest platform of its kind in Latin America.
For its part, Bitso calls this a “first step towards a larger sustainability strategy to address the environmental impacts of the crypto industry.” Moss projects the deal “will save around 342 thousand trees in the Amazon, offsetting approximately 5,283 tons of carbon dioxide.” In total, Moss says it has helped save “approximately 152 million trees in the Amazon through internationally certified and audited projects” since March 2020.