Minecraft mod adds carbon emissions

Now that Minecraft has been officially released to the world, some players are taking things to the next level.

Minecraft enthusiast James Smith has created a mod that adds carbon emissions to the game. Activities like burning wood, planks, coal, tree saplings, and even cows are tracked via an in-mod tracker that instructs to an outside platform to calculate the number of emissions made, based on real Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change data.

Smith is an employee of AMEE, a data company that aggregates environmental and energy data to provide up-to-date numbers on greenhouse gases. The Minecraft mod uses AMEE's own data tracker--AMEEconnect--to measure the in-game emissions against those of the real world. As the carbon counter increases in the game, the mod changes the surrounding environment accordingly, dark skies and murky clouds included.

"Of course, there are also ways to remove carbon from the atmosphere. Plant a tree, and AMEEconnect will work out how much carbon was taken up by the tree growing, and reduce the tracker by that amount. After a long day of mining and smelting, you'll have to go plant a few trees to keep the weather nice," Smith said in his blog post about the mod.

For more on Minecraft, check out GameSpot's review.