The Virgin Earth Challenge

The prize was conceived and financed by Sir Richard Branson, a successful British entrepreneur, and was announced in London on 9 February 2007

The Prize will be awarded to "a commercially viable design which, achieves or appears capable of achieving the net removal of significant volumes of anthropogenic, atmospheric GHGs each year for at least 10 years.

The Virgin Earth Challenge is intended to inspire inventors to find ways of bringing GHGs back down again to avoid the dangerous levels of global warming and sea level rise.

Among more than 2600 applications, 11 finalists were announced on November 2, 2011.