KlimaDAO is excited to welcome C3, the Crypto Carbon Company, as a new partner in the ReFi ecosystem. Positioning itself as “a gateway for the ReFi economy and a partner to existing players”, C3 is introducing its own complementary tokenized carbon credits, reward incentives, and carbon bridge—creating an even richer ecosystem.
C3 is an API-powered bridge with exciting new contributions on both the on-chain and off-chain ends of the spectrum. On the web3 side, it has embedded strong incentives into its tokenomics in the form of C3 rewards. On the traditional carbon market side, it brings to the table longstanding partnerships with major carbon offset provider Aither, as well as both the Verra and Gold Standard verification organizations.
High-quality carbon assets
C3 is introducing two carbon tokens at launch: Universal Basic Offset (UBO) and Nature Based Offset (NBO).
The UBO pool will include all Gold Standard and Verra credits with a vintage of 2014+, increasing +1 each calendar year, with the exception of certain blacklisted methodologies, soon to be shared in the C3 Gitbook. This pool casts a wide net to encourage deep liquidity and a robust supply of carbon for the foundation of ReFi.
The NBO pool is designed to include the high-quality credits most attractive to buyers in order to maximize the impact of ReFi. It will consist of agriculture, forestry, and land use credits, also with a vintage of 2014+ and again increasing +1 each calendar year.
The criteria for both UBO and NBO represent commodified pools of carbon credits that can serve the market's needs for carbon sourcing and retirement. In terms of the quality spectrum, UBO and NBO are higher-quality vintages than BCT and NCT but lower quality than MCO2, which is exclusively 2016+ REDD+ credits from the Amazon basin.
Note: we have received a request from Xpansiv CBL to remove the statement that the C3 carbon pools are analogous to the GEO and N-GEO contracts. KlimaDAO confirms that the C3 pools are not analogous to Xpansiv CBL's contracts and there is no association between C3's UBO and NBO with Xpansiv's GEO and N-GEO contracts .
Permissionless bridge
C3 is able to facilitate rapid onboarding of new carbon credits thanks to its API-driven permissionless bridge, which includes native support for offset retirements.
C3 is closely partnered with Aither, one of Europe's largest carbon project developers and credit traders, with an annual revenue of €1.1 billion. C3 bridge's automation engine allows anyone with a verified project that meets the carbon token criteria to permissionlessly bring carbon credits on-chain. This significantly streamlines the credit onboarding process and eliminates the need to manually review projects.
By supporting on-chain retirement at launch, and maintaining a close relationship with KlimaDAO, C3 makes carbon offsetting accessible to a new audience of consumers and brokers. C3’s launch opens the door for Aither’s clients to source and retire carbon tonnage on-chain.
Incentivizing ReFi
Participants who stake, bridge, or provide liquidity of tokenized carbon credits through the c3.app will receive rewards in the form of C3 tokens.
The pools for NBO and UBO will be hosted on SushiSwap and will have the following pairs initially: UBO/KLIMA, NBO/KLIMA, C3/FRAX, and USDC/KLIMA. There will also be three single-sided staking vaults for UBO, NBO, and wsKLIMA. C3 rewards will also be available to participants who bridge UBO or NBO credits through the app.
These are the introductory pairs and incentivized actions, but C3 intends to expand these over time as it develops more partnerships in the ReFi space.
The C3 token is the governance and utility token of the C3 ecosystem. Revenue generated from current and future C3 products will flow back to the protocol, either by distribution or growth in the ecosystem. This value will ultimately be passed back to C3 users.
Locking C3 tokens in escrow as veC3 entitles the participant to protocol fees as well as voting rights. The longer veC3 is locked, the greater amount of veC3 is earned. The more veC3 a participant holds, the greater influence they have in protocol governance.
C3, KlimaDAO, and the ReFi ecosystem
C3 first arrived on the scene in January 2022. As early supporters of KlimaDAO, the 20 members of the company were inspired by KlimaDAO’s impact on the voluntary carbon market and decided to develop their own complementary contributions to the on-chain carbon economy.
To foster a productive early partnership, 10% of initial C3 supply has been awarded to KlimaDAO. As part of KIP-15, KlimaDAO voted on March 5 to approve the longest vote locking of KlimaDAO’s vested C3 tokens to maximize governance rights—demonstrating the two organizations’ confidence in one another and in ReFi’s future.
KlimaDAO and C3 will collaborate closely in their shared mission of accelerating and democratizing climate action by creating a robust on-chain market for carbon credits. The strong alignment between these players, both in terms of tokenomics and industry relationships, will unlock synergies to catalyze this nascent market and ultimately maximize climate impact. If you are interested in getting involved with KlimaDAO, join us on Discord and follow us on Twitter.
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