Retire Carbon

Initiate carbon retirements via a REST endpoint

In the code examples below we use api.carbonmark.com as the base URL, however, when consuming our API, be sure to prefix the API URL with a version number. For example, the base URL of version 1 would be v1.api.carbonmark.com.

Any changes that we make to an API version are guaranteed to be backwards compatible. However, if you omit the version prefix (api.carbonmark.com) your application will be exposed to breaking changes because api.carbonmark.com is always routed to the latest major version.

Carbonmark's API offers developers a path to initiate carbon retirements via a REST endpoint. Follow the guide below to get started:

In this guide, you will learn to:

  • Get access to the Carbonmark developer dashboard and get your API Key

  • Find a project or index product to retire

  • Identify the listing details

  • Create a quote

  • Create an order

  • Confirm carbon credit retirement

What is the difference between retiring carbon from a seller listing and retiring carbon from a pool?

Listings can be from an individual or organization seller (i.e. Seller Listing) or from a Carbon Pool. A project may therefore have multiple listings at different price points.

Seller listing prices are controlled by the seller. Carbon Pool pricing is dynamic and can incur slippage.

Retire Carbon Steps

1. Dashboard access and create an API key

  • Create an account or login with your existing Carbonmark account on our Developer Dashboard.

  • Once logged in, visit the Keys page to generate an API key.

  • You can create Test API key's for free in a Sandbox environment. These can be used to test the API endpoints and for development access.

  • When you are ready to access paid Production API key's, contact our Solutions team to be white-listed and complete onboarding.

The API Key is sensitive and can be used to create costly retirements on your behalf. Be careful not to expose the API Key or commit it to your repository. Note that you can create a sandbox key for testing purposes. Keys are generated once and not exposed in the Developer Dashboard so you must copy them to be utilized.

2. Find a project or index product to retire

Use the carbonmark.com marketplace or api.carbonmark.com/carbonProjects to identify a project or api.carbonmark.com/products to identify an index product you’d like to retire. The Retirement API is compatible with any credit that has a visible price.

The /carbonProjects endpoint allows you to retrieve an array of carbon projects filtered by desired query parameters and returns project metadata and prices. Make note of the "key" (for example, VCS-191) of the project you are interested in.

The /products endpoint allows you to retrieve an array of carbon index products filtered by desired query parameters and returns products metadata and prices. Make note of the "id" (for example, mco2) of the product you are interested in.

You can also check out our various guides to discovering carbon projects or index products via our REST API.

3. Identify the listing details

Listing details for a project or product can be returned for an array of ID's and other query parameters. For example, api.carbonmark.com/prices?projectsIds={project key}&projectsIds={project key}. Or api.carbonmark.com/prices?productIds={productID} . See /prices endpoint for details. Note that a /prices response may include type "listing" (i.e. seller listing) or "carbon_pool" or "product" depending on the query parameters used.

Project JSON example

// api.carbonmark.com/prices?projectIds=VCS-191&projectIds=VCS-1100
// sample JSON response

{
    "sourceId": "listing-137-0xa6dbf88e90c12b3bf8e6fb39d08b56ceaca14b7f26648d83d4e98e12b94b9f8a",
    "type": "listing",
    "purchasePrice": 0.9945,
    "baseUnitPrice": 0.765,
    "supply": 16.995,
    "minFillAmount": 0.001,
    "listing": {
      "id": "0xa6dbf88e90c12b3bf8e6fb39d08b56ceaca14b7f26648d83d4e98e12b94b9f8a",
      "creditId": {
        "vintage": 2008,
        "projectId": "VCS-191"
      },
      "token": {
        "id": "0xb139c4cc9d20a3618e9a2268d73eff18c496b991",
        "address": "0xb139c4cc9d20a3618e9a2268d73eff18c496b991",
        "name": "Toucan Protocol : TCO2-VCS-191-2008",
        "isExAnte": false,
        "symbol": "TCO2-VCS-191-2008",
        "tokenId": 0
      },
      "sellerId": "0xcb6222f4df04385ea08e8da2a5871131ff5f6cba"
    }
  },
  {
    "sourceId": "carbon_pool-137-0x9e9b3a0208e19c44096fdaf99c09fd4991e52e73-0-bct",
    "type": "carbon_pool",
    "purchasePrice": 0.9536202,
    "baseUnitPrice": 0.733554,
    "supply": 230432.746766008,
    "minFillAmount": 0.001,
    "carbonPool": {
      "creditId": {
        "vintage": 2012,
        "projectId": "VCS-1100"
      },
      "token": {
        "id": "0x9e9b3a0208e19c44096fdaf99c09fd4991e52e73",
        "address": "0x9e9b3a0208e19c44096fdaf99c09fd4991e52e73",
        "name": "Toucan Protocol : TCO2-VCS-1100-2012",
        "isExAnte": false,
        "symbol": "TCO2-VCS-1100-2012",
        "tokenId": null
      },
      "isDefaultPoolCredit": false,
      "poolName": "bct"
    }
  }

Product JSON example

// api.carbonmark.com/prices?productIds=mco2
// sample JSON response
[
  {
    "sourceId": "product-137-mco2",
    "type": "product",
    "purchasePrice": 0.568542,
    "baseUnitPrice": 0.43734,
    "supply": 71567.890008707,
    "minFillAmount": 0.001,
    "product": {
      "id": "mco2",
      "token": {
        "id": "0xaa7dbd1598251f856c12f63557a4c4397c253cea",
        "address": "0xaa7dbd1598251f856c12f63557a4c4397c253cea",
        "name": "Moss Earth : MCO2",
        "isExAnte": false,
        "symbol": "MCO2",
        "tokenId": null
      }
    }
  }
]

4. Create a retirement quote

The next step is to create a "Quote" for the listing you are interested in using the /quotes endpoint .

A header is required to provide the Authorization bearer token. The required parameters for a quote are asset_price_source_id and quantity_tonnes.

const url = 'https://api.carbonmark.com/quotes';
const data = {
  asset_price_source_id: 'carbon_pool-137-0xccacc6099debd9654c6814fcb800431ef7549b10-0-bct',
  quantity_tonnes: 1
};

const headers = {
  'Accept': 'application/json',
  'Authorization': 'Bearer cm_api_d286bc5a-9980-43b7-9507-7fc013fecca8',
  'Content-Type': 'application/json'
};

fetch(url, {
  method: 'POST',
  headers: headers,
  body: JSON.stringify(data)
})
  .then(response => {
    if (!response.ok) {
      throw new Error('Network response was not ok ' + response.statusText);
    }
    return response.json();
  })
  .then(data => {
    console.log(data);
  })
  .catch(error => {
    console.error('There was a problem with the fetch operation:', error);
  });

This is a response example, note the uuid which will be required to generate an order.

{
  "asset_price_source_id": "carbon_pool-137-0xb139c4cc9d20a3618e9a2268d73eff18c496b991-0-bct",
  "uuid": "07495f6c-8b02-465d-8fdd-4bcc2d2047e9",
  "created_at": "2024-03-25T19:28:41.73536+00:00",
  "updated_at": "2024-03-25T19:28:41.73536+00:00",
  "credential_id": 93,
  "quantity_tonnes": 1,
  "cost_usdc": 0.434118,
  "consumed": 0
}

5. Create a retirement order

The next step is to create an "Order" for the quote generated above using the /orders endpoint .

A header is required to provide the Authorization bearer token. The required parameters for an order request are quote_uuid (from the /quote response), beneficiary_name, and retirement message.

Note that some registries have specific requirements. For example, creating an order for a Puro.earth registry credit requires consumption_metadata to be submitted in the request.

const url = 'https://api.carbonmark.com/orders';
const data = {
  quote_uuid: 'e632eafd-9a67-4af1-8acc-16d72f5a738f',
  beneficiary_name: 'Mother Nature',
  beneficiary_address: '0x6fb0e62afB345951997bd5149a313df9fcB72C2d',
  retirement_message: 'This is a retirement message',
  consumption_metadata: {
    country_of_consumption_code: 'string',
    consumption_period_start: 0,
    consumption_period_end: 0
  }
};

const headers = {
  'Accept': 'application/json',
  'Authorization': 'Bearer cm_api_d286bc5a-9980-43b7-9507-7fc013fecca8',
  'Content-Type': 'application/json'
};

fetch(url, {
  method: 'POST',
  headers: headers,
  body: JSON.stringify(data)
})
  .then(response => {
    if (!response.ok) {
      throw new Error('Network response was not ok ' + response.statusText);
    }
    return response.json();
  })
  .then(data => {
    console.log(data);
  })
  .catch(error => {
    console.error('There was a problem with the fetch operation:', error);
  });

This is a response example.

{
  "created_at": "2024-03-25T22:01:23.236141+00:00",
  "updated_at": "2024-03-25T22:01:23.236141+00:00",
  "status": "SUBMITTED",
  "transaction_hash": null,
  "polygonscan_url": null,
  "view_retirement_url": null,
  "quote": {
    "asset_price_source_id": "listing-137-0x12dbdff6fa065abc002324b5f2c1546b06e0440b1906438669a492e1987690f4",
    "uuid": "07495f6c-8b02-465d-8fdd-4bcc2d2047e9",
    "created_at": "2024-03-25T22:01:23.236141+00:00",
    "updated_at": "2024-03-25T22:01:23.236141+00:00",
    "credential_id": 93,
    "quantity_tonnes": 1,
    "cost_usdc": 0.5,
    "consumed": 0
  },
  "consumption_metadata": {},
  "registry_specific_data": {}
}

You should receive a response containing your order details including order status of your order which will allow you to confirm your order has been SUBMITTED and will be completed shortly.

The actual retirement transaction will be initiated instantly by our system, and broadcast to a blockchain network so the underlying credit is permanently retired and taken out of circulation.

It typically takes between 0.5 and 3 seconds for the retirement to be complete — this includes order creation, transaction broadcast, confirmation on the blockchain, and final retirement certificate generation.

5. Confirm your order is complete and view your retirement receipt

To verify your order has been completed, send a request to https://api.carbonmark.com/orders?quote_uuid=uuid.

Once your order status is COMPLETED, your order is complete and the carbon credit has been retired.

You can follow the polygonscan_url or view_retirement_url URLs in the response for further confirmation that your retirement order transaction is complete. Alternatively, you can navigate back to the Carbonmark Developer Dashboard and see the entry and the order status.

View retirement receipt

When the transaction is finalized and our system has marked the order status as “complete”, the provided URL should take you to the shareable retirement receipt.

https://app.carbonmark.com/retirements/{beneficiaryAddress}/{number}

For example: https://app.carbonmark.com/retirements/0xab5b7b5849784279280188b556af3c179f31dc5b/33

The order will appear in your developer dashboard as well.

The cost of the order will be added to your monthly invoice.

Want to learn more?

One of our solution specialists would be happy to answer any questions you have.

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