The Atmospheric Impact Framework
The AIF applies the same three steps to every climate solution.
The AIF complements existing registries, standards, and accounting methodologies, adding comparability without replacing them. It quantifies expected physical impact and it does not set rules or issue credits.
Step 1
Estimate impact
Model the climate effect over time using FaIR, an established, peer-reviewed climate model, accounting for factors such as gas type, timing, and how long greenhouse gases stay out of the atmosphere.
Step 2
Adjust for divergence
Assess the factors that can cause the expected climate impact of a nominal ton to diverge from the claimed amount, such as additionality, leakage, and lifecycle accounting.
Step 3
Normalize
Express the result relative to a defined Reference Ton, producing the Atmospheric Impact Score (AIS).
The Reference Ton
The common denominator.
The Reference Ton is an idealized ton: one ton of carbon dioxide removed or never emitted, with complete certainty, persisting with no risk of reversal over the evaluation window. It is the denominator in every Atmospheric Impact Score (AIS), which makes the result a simple, readable ratio.
A project scoring 0.62 delivers roughly 62 percent of an idealized ton’s climate impact. Ten issued tons from that project count as 6.2 AIF-adjusted tons. The score doesn’t pass or fail a project. It shows how much climate impact to expect, on the same scale to compare very different projects.
Illustrative. Scores are dimensionless ratios, where 1.00 indicates parity with the Reference Ton.
Seven assessment categories
What goes into the score
01
Durability
Will it last?
02
Measurement
How well was each ton measured?
03
Scenario
Compared to what?
04
Life Cycle Assessment
Did we count everything?
05
Secondary Climate Impacts
What other climate effects does it have?
06
Leakage
Did the problem simply move?
07
Additionality
Would it have happened anyway?
Each input starts from the best available evidence, uncertainty is propagated through simulation, and the reported score is deliberately conservative. The full treatment will be published in the methodology.
The framework over time
Built to learn.
Aii will update the framework as the evidence advances. Over the long term, a verification research program aims to test its predictions against what is actually observed in the atmosphere.
Now · bottom-up
Score the projects
The AIF translates any project into a single, comparable assessment of expected atmospheric impact.
Long term · top-down
Check against the atmosphere
A long-term research program currently under design aims to detect and attribute the aggregated effect of climate action in observed greenhouse gas concentrations, likely starting regionally. Where predictions and observations diverge, the framework gets recalibrated.
Today the framework scores projects. Atmospheric verification is a long-term research goal.
The MVP
What is the MVP?
A proofpoint for the AIF’s potential.
The minimum viable product, or MVP, is one unified methodology, scoped to carbon credits and tested against real portfolios.
Applied to
Shaped by
The MVP is a starting point. The work ahead to mature the framework includes pilots with real portfolios, published case studies, and scaling the number of projects scored.
The MVP focuses on carbon credits, deliberately spanning very different project types, and we believe the unit extends to all climate solutions.
Design choices
Built with intention.
Building a framework like this means making hard choices about what to assess, what to leave out, and how to handle uncertainty. The core design choices are laid out in the Methodology Overview. The full treatment, including alternatives we rejected or deferred, will come with the published methodology.
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