That depends a lot on communication. Independently of this, there are app-internal incentives, such as the feature “Friends invite friends”. In Aachen, for example, the number of participants was over 20,000 after a few months. Smaller municipalities can expect 5 to 10 percent of the inhabitants to use the app. The increase is open to the top through good public relations.

There are already hundreds of supra-regional offers in the marketplace of the Klima-Taler app, which are available to all cities and municipalities. Among them are Komoot, the outdoor app, PooPick, provider of ecologically degradable dog waste bags or Röhrli, straws made of glass. Our advice is to get 5 to 10 regional companies plus a few municipal offers such as free admission to the swimming pool or cultural and sporting events for the Klima-Taler app. But that is not a prerequisite. The Klima-Taler app can also be used without local support, or the businesses can be added to the marketplace in the course of use.

In addition, all participants can use the Climate Coins to reduce their CO2 emissions, which were recorded with the app on the basis of their own flights, car journeys and energy consumption. This is fun, raises awareness of one’s own impact on the climate and costs no money, as each Climate Coin is proven to be based on 5 kg of CO2 savings. These savings can make up for an equally high emission. Thus, the Climate Coin has its own advantage in the Klima-Taler ecosystem.

Yes, the app can also distinguish fast cyclists from slow car drivers, for example. The tracking is based on the evaluation of GPS and sensor data from the smartphone, from which probabilities for the mobility types are derived. The accuracy is 90 to 95 percent and depends on the smartphone manufacturer, the electronic components installed, the environment in which the measurements are taken, the length of the routes, the traffic volume and the network coverage. However, inaccuracies cannot be ruled out by the technology, especially since we do everything we can to record the routes in the background with as little battery and data consumption as possible. The convenience for users of not having to remember to start and end routes manually far outweighs these inaccuracies.

Yes, you can of course cancel your subscription annually. The cancellation period is 3 months before the end of the subscription.

In Münster in 2019, we reached rather young, digitally affine users, whereas 2.5 years later in Aachen we have a good cross-section of the population. We have more and more users and also significantly older participants. The current crises have shaken people up. They want to get involved.

Mobility recording is not limited to a specific municipality. All journeys made by all users are recorded. Of course, this also includes commuters who use regional and long-distance trains. The savings are attributed to the respective city team in which the users have registered.

Yes, rail travel is also recorded. We distinguish between routes that are shorter than 50 kilometres, local transport, and over 50 kilometres, long-distance transport. Short-distance traffic is calculated with 0.075 kg CO2 savings per km and long-distance traffic with 0.095 kg CO2 savings.

For one Climate Coin, you have to travel about 30 kilometres by bike and on foot, 67 kilometres by bus and train (within the city) or about 53 kilometres by long-distance transport.

We calculate the savings compared to car emissions of about 220 grams of CO2 per kilometre. We only record routes outside of buildings. About 20 percent of the measured distances are also covered for sporting reasons (jogging, walking the dog, etc). In order not to have to filter out these journeys, which do not replace car journeys – also for reasons of data economy – we reduce the CO2 savings for journeys made on foot and by bike from the 220 g/km by 20 percent (176 g/km). In this way, we achieve the correct CO2 values again for all routes