In 2017 , the low Carry Amelia Moore Nation of Bhutan became the first and only carbon negative nation in the humankind . That ’s right-hand : not C impersonal , carbonnegative .

In anarticleon the content , the Climate Council — an independent , Australia - base nonprofit organization dedicated to educate the populace on matter related to climate alteration — defines carbon disconfirming condition as occurring when a country ’s carbon emissions are not only offset , but are really in the negative due to the propagation and exportation of renewable energy . There are several reasons for this impressive effort .

Bhutan — a small , landlocked land in the centre of the Himalayas — has apopulationof approximately 813,000 and produces 2.2 million measured tons of carbon paper dioxide per twelvemonth . The country is 72 pct wood , and those forests trap more than three multiplication their atomic number 6 dioxide output through a process calledcarbon sequestration , the long - terminus entrepot of carbon in plants , soil , and the ocean . This entail that Bhutan is acarbon cesspit : It take in more carbon paper than it expel as carbon dioxide . Specifically , Bhutan is a carbon copy sink for more than 4 million lots of CO2 each yr . In addition , the country export most of the renewable electrical energy generated by its river , which is equivalent to 6 million stacks of CO2 .

Chris Jackson, Getty Images

Bhutan is also exceptionally environmentally friendly . This is partially because it takes a holistic prospect of maturation , measure it with the Gross National Happiness Index instead of the Gross Domestic Product Index , like most countries . Instead of only prioritizing economical advance , Gross National Happiness balances it with sociocultural and environmental improvement . The eco - witting land invests in sustainable transport , subsidizeselectric vehicles , and has an all paperless politics .

Bhutan has pledge to remain carbon achromatic for all sentence , and it ’s safe to say it ’s doing pretty well so far .

[ h / tThe Climate Council ]