Explosive! Dutch Bank Links Customers’ Expenditure with CO2 Emissions

We’ve recently published articles about governments in Bologna, Vienna, Bavaria and Belgium making plans to implement social credit systems: those who consume less CO2 will be rewarded. In the Netherlands, starting on 22 April, the first Dutch bank, and possibly the first in Europe, is linking payment transactions with CO2 emissions.

Mastercard, in collaboration with a start-up, already has a credit card that monitors and automatically cuts off spending when purchases have reached their “carbon max” – an initiative praised by the World Economic Forum.

Now, the second-largest bank in the Netherlands, Rabobank, has begun to monitor CO2 emissions of every payment made.

Rabobank does not want to go as far as Mastercard. Its new tool is voluntary and is being sold as a service and not as a disciplinary procedure … for now.

The bank’s CEO, Barbara Baarsma, said: “The goal is absolutely not to point the finger as a bank and act as an advisor.”

To sell the idea to the public Baarsma wraps the innovation in fluffy language: “We want to give people insight into their own behaviour and if they want to, they can adapt their behaviour.”

Baarsma is considered an “expert” in the Netherlands: she advises the Ministry of Health through “expert commissions” and often makes guest appearances in the media.

The bank is also already issuing vouchers to farmers who are doing something about CO2 emissions....<<<Read More>>>...