Largest cryptocurrency exchange in Latin America to develop renewable energy tokens

Mercado Bitcoin and Comerc plan to launch two separate tokens incentivizing renewable energy use.

In an announcement to Reuters News on Thursday morning, Brazillian cryptocurrency exchange Mercado Bitcoin said it has signed an agreement with Comerc, one of the main retail energy providers in Brazil, to develop renewable energy tokens. Mercado Bitcoin and Comerc seek to implement two types of tokens.

The first, set to launch in 2022, will be tied to a cashback scheme for solar energy generation. Currently, Comerc customers receive up to 15% to 20% of their electricity bills' value in cashbacks should they choose to switch to solar energy. The second token will be linked to certificates that document energy consumption from renewable sources.

In a statement to Reuters, Matheus Nogueira, CEO of Nori, a company that distributes energy for Comerc, said the following:

The token can be treated like any other currency, but it has an additional benefit, it is a token that represents a renewable generation.

Meanwhile, an executive linked to the project at Comerc gave the following remark regarding the three "Ds" of the company's initiative regarding renewable energy:

First, decarbonization, encouraging clean energy; the second is decentralization, our plants are based on distributed generation…, and finally, digitalization.

Mercado Bitcoin claims to be the largest cryptocurrency in Latin America, with more than three million customers. According to CoinGecko, the exchange lists 11 coins and had a trading volume of $19.4 million in the past 24 hours. Earlier this year, Mercado Bitcoin attracted a $200 million investment from Japanese multinational conglomerate Softbank. The exchange has processed the USD equivalent of over $5 billion in crypto trades since January.