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Google purchases carbon removal credits from Brazil start-up, signing up with Microsoft

Alphabet unit Google has concurred for the first time ever to purchase naturebased carbon removal credits from a Brazilian start-up, its first engagement with carbon tasks in the South American nation.

Google will purchase 50,000 metric tons of carbon removal credits by 2030 from Mombak, which acquires degraded land from farmers and ranchers or partners with them to replant native species in the Amazon jungle, the companies said on Thursday.

Google, which had formerly bought crafted removal credits, follows fellow U.S. tech giant Microsoft, which in 2015 inked an offer to buy up to 1.5 million credits from Mombak.

The Brazilian start-up and Google did not reveal terms of the deal. In 2023, when it sold credits to McLaren Racing, Mombak priced them at approximately more than $50 per heap.

The vote of confidence for us and this sector in basic that originates from Google stepping into this is an actually positive signal, Mombak's Chief Innovation Officer Dan Harburg said in an interview, hoping it would activate more offers.

The announcement comes as companies and authorities collect this month in New york city for its yearly Climate Week.

Earlier this week, Facebook owner Meta accepted purchase up to 3.9 million carbon offset credits from Brazilian investment bank BTG Pactual's forestry arm.

Google, Microsoft, Meta and Salesforce are the co-founders of the so-called Symbiosis Union, which promises to contract for as much as 20 million lots of nature-based carbon elimination credits by 2030.

Carbon offsets permit business to make up for greenhouse gas emissions by spending for actions to cut emissions elsewhere to meet business climate goals. Each credit represents a reduction of one ton of carbon dioxide emissions.

Critics of carbon offset markets, consisting of Greenpeace, state they allow emitters to keep releasing greenhouse gases.

(source: Reuters)