Brilliant Carbon Review: Ausante without mistakes?
Brilliant Carbon attempt to merge the purchasing of carbon credits with MLM. The Brilliant Carbon website names Nigel Allan (below right) and Haakon Grunnan as the co-founders of the company, with Allan also serving as company President.
The formation of Brilliant Carbon, as provided on their website, is certainly an interesting read. It begins with the launch of a similar carbon credits based MLM opportunity, Ausante.
In early 2011 Nigel was approached by Tahir Ali and Mark Chadwick to set up a new MLM company called Ausante, along with Carl Mallinson, of Ceejay Commodities Ltd from Zambia, who was going to be planting trees to back up the environmental sales.
This seemed like a noble cause and Nigel agreed to become an equal shareholder and Director of the company.
Nigel, along with Haakon Grunnan, proceeded to build a large worldwide sales network of people offsetting their carbon footprint….or so he believed.
After Tahir Ali forced Carl Mallinson out of the company in October 2011, and did not pay him for the trees he had planted, Ausante no longer had a ‘product’ backing up the sales they were making.
It became clear that the only way to become legal and transparent about what people were buying was to purchase and retire real carbon credits in customers’ names.
Unfortunately Nigel was deceived by the other directors and no carbon credits were ever purchased and retired by Ausante in the name of Ausante customers (easily provable by searching the public registries), even after millions of dollars in sales of ‘nonexistent’ credits had already been made.
Not wishing to be part of a worldwide fraud, Nigel resigned from the company in June 2012.
Nigel and Haakon then spent the next twelve months putting together the business and systems known as BrilliantCarbon.
It’s worth noting that before Allan left Ausante in June, Ali had already begun launching Ausante spinoffs. CO2 Rewards was one such spinoff, reviewed here on BehindMLM in March of 2012.
CO2 Rewards offer their members the ability to acquire customers through the company itself (whether or not they charge for this service is unclear), effectively it’s entirely possible to use CO2 Rewards as an investment program.
You purchase units, give them away to customers the company supposedly provides you and then earn a return on the money you fed into the company.
Today the Ausante website is still online, with Ali’s partner Mark Chadwick listed as CEO. CO2 Rewards on the other hand no longer exists.
On the Brilliant Carbon website Allan claims Brilliant Carbon was created because he was ‘determined to learn from Ausante’s mistakes‘.
As for where Brilliant Carbon are based out of, a “Brilliant Carbon Support” address is provided in London along with a UK-based contact number for Nigel Allan, however whether the actual business is based out of the UK is not clear.
Read on for a full review of the Brilliant Carbon MLM business opportunity.
The Brilliant Carbon Product Line
Like Ausante, Brilliant Carbon use carbon offset credits as their product. Despite the company advertising a “retail customer” membership option on their website, Brilliant Carbon doesn’t appear to have a retail side to the business.
If one wishes to apply to join as a retail customer, the description of the membership is as follows:
Enrol as a Retail Customer on the website of your referring EcoPartner and receive: Access to the BrilliantCarbon member’s area to be able to participate in our lucrative rewards program.
Retail customers cannot earn commissions and should be separated from the income opportunity, which is not the case in Brilliant Carbon.
The reality is that these “retail customers” are infact affiliates. Once an affiliate has joined Brilliant Carbon, they are then able to put money into “EcoPartner Packages”.
When you enrol with an EcoPlan on the website of your Mentor (referrer) BrilliantCarbon retires a specific quantity of carbon offsets on your behalf according to the EcoPlan you purchased.
‘Retirement’ is the carbon credit industry jargon for ‘removing carbon credits from circulation’ so they cannot be resold or double counted in any way. In other words, they are considered ‘used’.
“Casino games” and “auctions” are also mentioned, however no further information is provided. Neither casino games or auctions are visible on the Brilliant Carbon website either so I’m not sure what’s going on there.
The Brilliant Carbon Compensation Plan
The Brilliant Carbon Compensation plan revolves around affiliates joining the company and then buying EcoPartner Packages.
There are three EcoPartner Packages a Brilliant Carbon affiliate can deposit money into:
- Silver EcoPlan – $200 (8 tonnes CO2 removed from the atmosphere)
- Gold EcoPlan – $1000 (40 tonnes CO2 removed from the atmosphere)
- Platinum EcoPlan – $3000 (120 tonnes CO2 removed from the atmosphere)
Recruitment Commissions
The Fast Start Bonus is paid out whenever a newly recruited affiliate joins Brilliant Carbon and deposits money into an EcoPartner Package:
- Silver EcoPlan – $15
- Gold EcoPlan – $75
- Platinum EcoPlan – $225
Note that an affiliate must personally buy-in at the plan level they wish to earn a commission on. For example, if a Brilliant Carbon affiliate who has bought in at the Silver level sells a Platinum EcoPlan, they will still only earn the Silver EcoPlan bonus of $15.
Residual Binary Commissions
Residual commissions in Brilliant Carbon are paid out using a binary compensation structure. A binary compensation structure places an affiliate at the top of the binary, with two positions directly under them.
These two positions form the start of two binary teams, with each position branching out into another two positions down a theoretically infinite depth.
Each week Brilliant Carbon calculates the sales volume generated between the two binary teams, paying out an affiliate 10% of the weaker team’s sales volume.
This sales volume is removed from the binary once paid out on (including matching volume from the stronger binary team), with excess volume carried over to the following week.
Sales volume is generated by the “purchase” of EcoPartner Packages by recruited affiliates.
Weekly binary commissions are capped, depending on how much a Brilliant Carbon affiliate have themselves deposited into the company:
- Silver EcoPlan – weekly binary commissions capped at $1000
- Gold EcoPlan – weekly binary commissions capped at $4000
- Platinum EcoPlan – weekly binary commissions capped at $25,000
Matching Binary Commissions Bonus
Brilliant Carbon offer a matching bonus on binary commissions earnt by a personally recruited downline. The company tracks this matching bonus using a unilevel style compensation structure.
A unilevel compensation structure places an affiliate at the top of a unilevel team, with every personally recruited affiliate placed directly under them (level 1).
If any of these level 1 affiliates go on to recruit new affiliates of their own, they are placed on level 2 of the original affiliates unilevel team. If any level 2 affiliates recruit new affiliates they are placed on level 3 and so on and so forth down a theoretical unlimited number of levels.
Brilliant Carbon pays out a matching bonus on the binary commissions of recruited affiliates, payable down a maximum of three levels of recruitment:
- Sapphire Bonus (recruit at least two new affiliates) – 10% matching bonus on level 1
- Emerald (recruit at least 4 new affiliates (2 on each binary team), with all 4 affiliates having bought in at either the Gold or Platinum EcoPlan level) – 10% matching bonus on 2 levels
- Ruby (recruit at least 6 new affiliates (3 on each binary team), with all six affiliates having bought in at the Platinum EcoPlan level) – 10% matching bonus on three levels
- Diamond (have at least 3 personally recruited Ruby qualified affiliates (one in three individual unilevel legs), and be generating a minimum 20,000 weekly volume in your weaker binary team) – 5% down all unilevel levels
- Blue Diamond (have at least 3 personally recruited Diamond qualified affiliates (one in three individual unilevel legs), and be generating a minimum 100,000 weekly volume in your weaker binary team) – 10% down all unilevel levels
- Black Diamond (have at least 3 personally recruited Blue Diamond qualified affiliates (one in three individual unilevel legs), and be generating a minimum 500,000 weekly volume in your weaker binary team) – 15% down all unilevel levels
- Crown Diamond (have at least 3 personally recruited Black Diamond qualified affiliates (one in three individual unilevel legs), and be generating a minimum 1,000,000 weekly volume in your weaker binary team) – 20% down all unilevel levels
Note that the Diamond and above matching bonus stacks on top of the Ruby bonus. Once an affiliate reaches Diamond qualification, they will continue to earn the 10% on three level Ruby bonus indefinitely.
Also note that in addition to the above qualification requirements, all affiliates must also purchase a “sweepstakes entry ticket” for each week they wish to be paid the bonus out on.
No further information is provided in the Brilliant Carbon compensation plan material explaining what a sweepstakes entry ticket is.
Binary Override Commissions
In addition to the matching bonus, an override commission is also available to Diamond Director and above ranked Brilliant Carbon affiliates.
Director ranks are an additional qualification available to Diamond and above ranked Brilliant Carbon affiliates:
- Diamond Director – have at least three personally recruited Ruby ranked binary matching bonus qualified affiliates in your downline, with each being in separate individual unilevel leg
- Blue Diamond Director – have at least three personally recruited Diamond ranked affiliates in your downline, with each being in a separate individual unilevel leg
- Black Diamond Director – have at least three personally recruited Blue Diamond ranked affiliates in your downline, with each being in a separate individual unilevel leg
- Crown Black Diamond Director – have at least three Black Diamond ranked affiliates anywhere in your downline, of which at least two must be personally recruited
The binary override is paid out using the same unilevel compensation structure as the matching bonus however it is a generational bonus, paying out a commission up until an affiliate of certain rank is found.
- Diamond – an additional 5% on matching binary commissions, payable until a Diamond or higher ranked affiliate is found.
- Blue Diamond – an additional 10% on matching binary commissions, payable until a Blue Diamond or higher ranked affiliate is found. If the top affiliate in any given unilevel leg is at the Diamond rank, the bonus paid out is 10% until the Diamond affiliate and 5% thereafter.
- Black Diamond – an additional 15% on matching binary commissions, payable until a Black Diamond or higher ranked affiliate is found. If the top affiliate in any given unilevel leg is at the Diamond rank, the bonus paid out is 15% until the Diamond affiliate and 10% thereafter. If the top affiliate in any given unilevel leg is at the Blue Diamond rank, the bonus paid out is 15% until the Blue Diamond affiliate and 5% thereafter.
- Crown Black Diamond – an additional 20% on matching binary commissions, payable until another Diamond or higher ranked affiliate is found. If the top affiliate in any given unilevel leg is at the Diamond rank, the bonus paid out is 20% until the Diamond affiliate and 15% thereafter. If the top affiliate in any given unilevel leg is at teh Blue Diamond rank, the bonus paid out is 20% until the Blue Diamond affiliate and 10% thereafter. If the top affiliate in any given unilevel is at the Black Diamond rank, the bonus paid out is 20% until the Black Diamond affiliate and 5% thereafter.
Brilliant Bonus Pool
The Brilliant Bonus Pool is made up of
5% of Global Revenues (excluding credit card sales) for the BrilliantBonus Pool to reward our top performers. In addition, 5% of the selling fee in the TurboBooster is added to the Pool, plus profitsharing from casino and auctions.
The pool is paid out monthly, with affiliates awarded a share in the pool for every “pro unit” they “hold”.
Brilliant Carbon do not explain what a pro unit is or how affiliates come to hold them in their compensation plan material.
Finally, in order to qualify for the Brilliant Bonus Pool an affiliate must ‘have purchased Sweepstakes entry tickets covering the Bonus Pool period in question ie the previous calendar month‘.
Diamond Credits
Although frequently mentioned in the Brilliant Carbon compensation plan, the company fails to explain what exactly its Diamond Credits are.
Diamond credits, not to be confused with “carbon credits” that affiliates purportedly pay Brilliant Carbon to “expire”, are virtual credits given to affiliates when they purchase one of the EcoPlans:
- Silver EcoPlan – 60 diamond credits
- Gold EcoPlan – 350 diamond credits
- Platinum EcoPlan – 1150 diamond credits
The credits are sorted into mandatory and free accounts, however Brilliant Carbon fail to explain what these are and how they relate to the compensation plan.
Affiliates can also win diamond credits if they use real money to buy a ticket in the company’s monthly sweepstakes draw (lottery).
Other diamond credits are paid out in a “casino account” and “auction account”, which I believe require affiliates to “spend” the credits in a virtual casino and auction.
Other than the mention of both a casino and auction on the Brilliant Carbon website, I was unable to find any further information on either. I presume, due to the fact that diamond credits are involved that these are affiliate-only ventures.
Finally, there’s also something called the TurboBooster which affiliates can buy into. No information as to what the TurboBooster is or does it provided by Brilliant Carbon in their compensation plan material.
Joining Brilliant Carbon
Affiliate membership to Brilliant Carbon is $29. Note that it is expected (and for some components of the compensation plan required) that affiliates buy into one of Brilliant Carbon’s EcoPlans.
This equates to an additional affiliate cost of ranging from $200 to $3000.
Conclusion
In an attempt to distance itself from the “mistakes” Ausante allegedly made, on the Brilliant Carbon website the company states
BrilliantCarbon believes in transparency. What you see is what you get.
How the company can claim this when so much information is withheld from the general public begs belief.
For starters, the Brilliant Carbon compensation plan is not provided to the general public (prospective affiliate) for review. The company demands people pay them $29 before they are provided any specific information about the attached MLM income opportunity.
This is the first red flag that pops up.
Compensation plan wise, if we ignore the whole carbon credits legitimacy thing for the time being, what we have is a pay-to-play scheme that in its most basic form, can be stripped down to affiliates paying to join the company, buying into one of three levels and then being paid a commission to recruit new affiliates to do the same.
That in itself is the definition of a pyramid scheme, with things only appearing more dubious when the rest of the compensation plan is analysed.
For starters, despite touting transparency in their marketing material, the reality is there is large chunks of vital information missing from the company’s hidden compensation plan material.
TurboBooster? PRO Units? What affiliates actually do with Diamond Credits? None of this information is provided yet the terms feature prominently in the compensation material Brilliant Carbon provide to affiliates.
TurboBooster sounds like a pay-to-play comp plan accelerator, with the money affiliates spend getting pumped back into the comp plan to pay out other affiliates.
Pro Units? No idea.
And Diamond Credits? A virtual currency that, from the sounds of the free and mandatory accounts, is a mechanism to trap as much affiliate money in the system once it’s deposited.
Throw in a casino, sweepstakes and auctions, and the viability of Brilliant Carbon’s carbon credits as an MLM product inevitably comes under question.
Simply put, why on Earth would you need sweepstakes, casino games and an auction to make the selling of carbon credits via MLM viable?
Nevermind the regulatory perils of marrying a casino to an MLM income opportunity.
Admittedly I know nothing much about carbon credits, but what I do know is this – the same holds true for CO2 Rewards and Ausante as it does for Brilliant Carbon.
In paying out commissions to affiliates, how do you remain competitive in the marketplace selling the same carbon credits non-MLM company’s are marketing?
There’s no product “edge” here as can be claimed with various other products – a carbon credit is a carbon credit is it not?
The money Brilliant Carbon pays out to its affiliates has to come from somewhere and in the process diminishes the viability of the price it charges affiliates to purchase carbon credits.
When looking at this from a “motivation of purchase” standpoint, it’s clear that those purchasing credits through Brilliant Carbon would only be doing so because of the attached income opportunity.
Throw in the recruitment commissions when recruited affiliates buy into the scheme and, although much more complexly masked than either Ausante or CO2 Rewards, Brilliant Carbon fails to address the core issue of long-term viability in the carbon credits MLM niche.
And if Ausante were indeed fudging the numbers on the carbon credits side of things as Brilliant Carbon President Nigel Allan alleges, that only confirms the lack of viability of the niche when attached to an MLM compensation plan.
The fact that carbon credits seem to be produced out of thin air (pun intended) alone seems to make the whole thing seem a bit dodgy IMHO.
Haakon Grunnan is a well known serial networker from Norway, “one of the experienced ones” with a track record dating back to “before the pyramids in Egypt were built”.
The problem with the “old ones” is that they usually have a lot of enemies. They simply ATTRACT different types of trouble when they become visible outside a limited group of “like minded”.
I’m not familiar with Haakon Grunnan, but a quick search shows involvment in WGI World Games Inc. (2004 or 2005), in a position over World Leaders with huge downlines (he was the one who recruited at least one of the World Leaders).
More recent activities:
Ausante (Carbon Credits)
Geon
some fuel additive, “fuel improvement pills”
online poker and casino
So this new thing is basically all of his previous stuff rolled into one giant ball of yarn?
May as well have called the company CPU. Short for Cow Pie Unlimited.
Lord knows we must reduce the massive amounts of CO2 cows alone produce via flatulence.
It’s very far from being ALL (his previous stuff).
It was the result of a “quick search”, a 2 minute view of the first search page in Google looking at the TYPE of information available. Most of it were in Norwegian, and most of it were rather old.
I’m not very familiar with any of the programs he has been involved in or organized, but he’s one of the “hard core” pyramid scheme organizers in that market, a few levels more “hard core” than e.g. “Bidify-Fraudy”.
None of the “hard core” pyramid scheme organizers have been very successful in the last 6-8 years, except for maybe UNAICO / SiteTalk. They are mostly fishing in a dried out pool of the same participants over and over again, a pool where people already are organized in existing uplines and downlines.
Hmmm, well since the only thing that warms the earth is the sun, buying carbon credits isn’t something I would feel morally inclined to participate anyway.
Firstly i appreciate your articles as they always contain insightful information.
I noticed that the article focused only on the plan and the past drama, i would have like to have seen some commentary on the work they are doing with regards to what carbon credits are and what benefits they produce.
Carbon Credits, climate shift, global warming provoke a wild array of opinions but rarely the actual benefits are revealed or proven and I would like to see proof of product because carbon credits to buy, sell and retire is far too easy to talk about rather than prove..
I welcome new companies to the carbon industry that present alternative and innovative ways of introducing people to a massive business opportunity that under pins an even bigger problem. Its in the news everyday, a planet being plundered with serious consequences, wild weather being just one of the consequences.
Because of the size of this gargantuan conservation trend, its very easy to just focus on the massive money machine this trend presents and pay little attention to the underlying problem that needs urgent attention and that is the mismanagement of our planets finite resources.
Just google ” deforestation ” and also ” what is a forest worth ” ?
Who would have thought that 10 years ago Mc Donalds would go Green and seeing Coke with green labels in Argentina ?
Green washing is here, as Green is the new Gold, in my Opinion.
The problem is that MLM Carbon Credits only are about money, and that VER certificates are voluntarily. They have a very small market, yet they are produced in huge quantities to use as investment vehicles for participants in different MLM companies.
The typical Carbon Offset MLM company is about fake or real projects that will generate VER certificates (fake or real, you only have voluntarily standards, so there isn’t much difference), where participants can invest in shares in that market, or in planting trees, or in selling certificates internally in a virtual market, or in any combination of those investment activities, or in any new investment activity I haven’t identified yet.
The primary market for the voluntarily CO2 certificates are for businesses with marketing needs, e.g. banks that want to have a “Carbon Neutral” green label attached to their names.
The secondary market is the general audience, they can buy “Carbon Credits” to voluntarily compensate for their own use of fossil fuel (e.g. air travel).
In reality, the market is limited to Europe. Other parts of the World have hardly heard about “Carbon Credits”.
The projects are typically about planting trees, but tree planting is an existing UN program not related to Carbon Credits. Deforestation is a different type of problem. Planting trees will TEMPORARILY capture carbon, but it’s not a solution to that type of problem.
MLM Carbon Credit projects are about attracting income opportunity seekers eager to make a profit in a market they believe is very profitable, but where most of the projects really are investment frauds. People should normally throw stones at the organizers rather than welcoming them.
@Oz
There’s probably a flaw in the product price information?
Silver EcoPlan – $200 (8 tonnes CO2)
$200 / 8 = $25 per ton PRICE
$15 recruitment commission = 7.5%
Gold EcoPlan – $400 (40 tonnes CO2) That must be wrong?
Gold EcoPlan – $1000 (40 tonnes CO2) corrected
$1000 / 40 = $25 per ton PRICE
$75 recruitment commission = 7.5%
Platinum EcoPlan – $3000 (120 tonnes CO2)
$3,000 / 120 = $25 per ton PRICE
$225 recruitment commission = 7.5%
Carbon credit in itself is already a rather ridiculous concept. When you couple it with MLM it’s even worse.
Carbon “credit” basically is a trade, involving payment from the rich to the poor so the rich can use what the poor has. Or if you’re more cynical, a bribe to keep the poor from consuming fossil fuel (so the rich can have more).
The whole idea is nebulous enough that you can pretty much make up as much carbon credit as you need. There’s no uniform global standard of carbon credit, much less a global market of carbon credit. Thus, a MLM selling carbon credit is even more ridiculous.
MLM model of commission requires a unique consumable item with high margins. No individuals will consume a carbon credit. Any one who does is basically making a donation to feel good, such as contribute to reforestation in Amazon.
So how do you make money off that, hmmm? By huge markups, of course.
But any markup would suggest that it’s a PARASITE on the actual cause, doesn’t it?
Carbon Credits are about 1/16th of the conservation process.
By themselves they are pretty much a money goround for banksters, big businesses, governments and the carbon cowboys. But when Carbon credits are used as financial drivers into real conservation projects you get a conglomeration of businesses that actually produce real benefits for those that need it the most.
The 1.8 billion people living in poverty relying on forests for their lively hood and somewhere to live their home.
Peddling Carbon Credits by themselves using MLM just wont do, you must connect beneficial results for the land, for the environment and for the people on the land. Otherwise your just skimming some BIG bucks from a business trend and you may as well go do a forex deal if its just about money, be honest.
Carbon credits and MLM as a straight commodity trade will produce collateral damage to the Carbon credit industry and MLM.
To do some real good you will need at least 20 Million dollars and a bunch of real forest projects, so that people can see that there is a lot more to the Carbon Credit industry, other than a fast buck that produces profits for a few.
If you going to play the Carbon Credit game make sure some millions goes into showing the world the side of economics that has been completely ignored that been externalities, David Suzuki talks about this and Carbon credits when used properly can start to address the problem.
The planet doesnt need us, we need the planet. Carbon credits when used properly provide real benefits to the planet and not just peoples pockets.
You just named it. It’s about parasitism for parasites.
The Certified Emission Reduction CER worked for a while. It made money being invested in both valuable and certified projects, and in the opposite types of projects. The only real market was the CER market, but it has collapsed completely because of over production / reduced demand (reduced industrial activities in Europe).
The Verified Emission Reduction VER have had a few valuable projects, but mostly the opposite. It’s a voluntarily and mostly non existent market, people simply don’t BUY that type of “product”.
The CER market (Wikipedia):
31 cents for CER, the “real market”. VER is normally lower priced, in the very small market where they still are traded, e.g. for marketing purposes.
I have seen some banks using “Carbon Neutral” in marketing, “just to show how environmental friendly they are”. That’s a few years ago, but the price is so low so it might be worth it.
Brilliant Carbon on the other hand is a scam. Planting trees can be a solution to deforestation in some countries, but buying “Carbon Credits” for 5 cents and selling it for $25 isn’t a solution to anything. Participants will become part of a problem rather than part of a solution.
OZ as always we see most program do not last and no real value and die.
As always man Great work Every one Support Oz.
@Cam
That’s because it wasn’t a review of carbon credits, but of Brilliant Carbon as an MLM business opportunity.
Any analysis of carbon credits is incidental to Brilliant Carbon’s business model and compensation plan.
@M_Norway
Rechecked the website and yes it’s indeed a thousand as the Gold level. Thanks for the pickup!
In the interests of transparency I received the following email from Nigel Allan (using a Brilliant Carbon email address that appears to be legit):
Noting not one correction or inaccuracy was brought to my attention, I replied:
I’ll update if I hear anything back.
Followup email received:
More “contact me for the real story” and rubbish, mixed in with how Allan believes reporters and investigators should conduct themselves.
Reply:
More correspondence (3 emails received and then my reply):
Email #1
“Those that need it most” = Nigel Allan, Haakon Grunnan and a core network of recruiters? 🙂
They clearly have some needs, that’s reflected throughout most of the program. “Conservation projects” seems mostly to be about gathering money from participants and redistributing it upwards in the system.
Tree planting projects don’t make much sense as a solution to climate gases. A tree will collect and store carbon throughout its life time, and then release it back into the nature as climate gases. That doesn’t make much sense in itself as a solution to climate gases.
Tree planting projects is about change in use of the land, a type of project that clearly isn’t supported by any climate groups. Change in use of the land is typically about rich people buying land from the poor, it’s neither a solution to any climate gases nor poverty problems. It’s the CAUSE of problems rather than solution to them.
It’s clear that Carbon Credits CAN create real benefits for “those that need it most” = Nigel Allan, Haakon Grunnan and a core network of loyal supporters. None of them seems to have had any success in the last few years, so they clearly have needs.
M Norway does have a point lets do some practical maths shall we? remember there is no one solution to consrvation.
Estimates for the amount of carbon dioxide emitted from “anthropogenic sources” (sources due to man’s activities) – this is mainly from fossil fuel burning – are around 22 billion tons per annum.
The amount of carbon dioxide taken up and held by forest in biomass of the trees is variable, but a figure of 120 tonnes of carbon per hectare as suggested here has been taken for the basis of the following calculations. This is in line with the range of similar values for a number of species of forest tree here and of Brazilian forest.
120 tonnes of carbon per hectare corresponds to 440 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent per hectare of mature forest trees.
Carbon – atomic mass = 12
Carbon dioxide – CO2 – molecular mass – 12 + 16 + 16 = 44
So a mature forest can soak up the equivalent of 440 tonnes of atmospheric carbon dioxide per hectare in the 50-100 years it takes to reach maturity – that’s a one-off total – not per year and may take several decades to get there.
In order to deal with currently generated carbon dioxide, an area of forest equivalent to:
22 billion tonnes divided by 440 tonnes per hectare – is needed
= 50 Million hectares per annum or 500 000 square kilometres per annum
…to be planted with forest and held in perpetuity (not cut down or allowed to revert back to atmospheric carbon dioxide).
This is approximately equivalent to the entire land area of Spain, twice as big as the United Kingdom and bigger than any US state other than Texas (696,621 sq km.) or Alaska (1,717,854 sq. km.) To be forested anew each year and held as such forever.
Therefore planting trees alone other than on a colossal scale is not going to even allow us to stand still
– let alone start to reverse the effects of global warming.
Every bit does help but we need to do more across every facet of our lives and forests are just one of them.
I didn’t have any intention going into a detailed climate gas debate, I only checked the Ausante / Brilliant Carbon idea of planting trees in Africa.
I checked a few of the CO2 MLM companies in 2010 and found a lot of scam. I also checked the CER / VER markets in Europe, and the main ideas from the Kyoto Protocol including types of projects – just to get an overview.
VER and CER is completely impossible for an average person to understand, e.g. to separate between “good” or “bad” projects. But supporting all types of projects in the belief that they all are “good” is clearly a mistake. It’s the cause of problems rather than a solution.
Brilliant Carbon is clearly not about any “good” environmental idea. “The ones who need it most” in that organization are old pyramid scheme organizers and loyal supporters. That’s about different types of needs, individual needs rather than environmental.
It doesn’t really matter whether they are planting trees in Africa or are buying / producing fake carbon credits (like Ausante), they will still be old pyramid scheme organizers trying to cover their own needs for “quick money”.
As an MLM opportunity, this looks a lot like a “reload scam” from a collapsed pyramid scheme, the type where some of the organizers are starting a new scheme when an old one has collapsed, where top earners are grandfathered in with as many people they can bring in from their old downlines.
It has all the symptoms of being a “reload scam”, e.g. clearly trying to attract people from a failed opportunity by explaining why it failed = unethical management (other than themselves).
For new participants, it’s better to stay away and let it collapse on its own, watching it from a distance rather than being involved in it, enjoying the feeling of “I finally did something right” rather than the feeling of empty promises and false hopes (you know what I’m talking about, and if you don’t know ask some former Bidify members).
And if in doubt, read my post #5 about fishing in a dried out pool. “Reload scams” will typically try to fish in dried out pools where they KNOW there are some fish left.
And the MLM is going to make huge profit by promising huge markups on such, thus DECREASING money going to those projects “produce real benefits”, does it not?
Then you need to strip out MLM which only subsist on the margins to pay out all those commissions. Which kills this thing deader than a doornail.
Hi Oz, A good review as always and seems to get to the heart of the issues. Here are a couple of points that I would like to make.
If there were any mistakes, then they happened while Nigel Allan was the President of Ausante at the time. You cannot be the President of a company and say that mistakes happened but they are not your fault. Either Mr Allan was incompetent or was complicit in any mistakes that happened.
I do not know how long this company has been going, but when you do a search on either youtube or google for Brilliant Carbon, there is nothing positive.
In any case, this is not good news for the future of Brilliant Carbon.
I have found some information about Ausante, the Norwegian part of that network, potential founders, background, etc.
Ausante was aroud 1 year into business when it terminated Nigel Allan / Haakon Grunnan (master distributor) around August 2012, due to unspecified “illoyality against the company” (suggested to be related to cross recruiting attempts in the source I found, but he didn’t explain why he had that theory).
Backgrund for most of the people involved from Norway seems to be World Games Inc (WGI), Geon, KB Gold, Freedom Fuel International (FFI). Haakon Grunnan seems to have beene local or global master distributor in a few. Frode Berg seems to have been local or global master distributor in some.
Leaders in Ausante (August 2012):
Nigel Allan (Geon, founder)
Haakon Grunnan (WGI, FFI, Geon)
Frode Berg (WGI, KB Gold, Innerlight)
Nandor Hegedust
Ladislav Pasztor
Mark Chadwick CEO / Founder
Source (Norwegian):
4brooker.wordpress.com/2012/08/07/uroligheter-i-ausante/
Other than WGI, I don’t think any of the companies listed have been much of a success. Some of them have been “noisy” for short period of time, e.g. KB Gold drew a lot of negative attention in Germany in 2010.
That explain the expression “those who need it the most”. Some people really NEED money from investors, and some projects clearly has that intention. 🙂
If Nigel Allan was an equal shareholder and the President of Ausante and he was terminated along with Haakon Grunnan the Master Distributor, then there has to be a bigger story. I doubt if the company would terminate someone that important in the structure for cross sponsoring.
AND: Where does Gabor Venczel fit into all of this. He was a President in Unaico. After promoting Unaico for 3 years and making a lot of money and getting a Villa in Thailand, he calls Unaico a scam.
You have to question the intelligence or the integrity of a man who promotes a scam for 3 years.
You may be right on this M_Norway. Since Ausante is still working this looks like a Reload of Unaico. Haakon Grunnan, Nigel Allan and Venczel Gabor. This really is a team you can believe in 🙂
Friends, Ausante has been very popular in last days. I did a lot of business in it. It gave me all the withdrawals on time and i was also happy with it.
But now, I’m having 1700$ in it and putted on withdrawal 2 months ago. There is no positive response from Ausante.
My question is that should i wait for withdrawal or leave it disappointedly??? Regards to all !!