Terms of Service
Claim provisions · R3CKON by Tahosa Systems
1. What the service does
Estimates the usage-phase environmental footprint of AI inference and retires verified environmental certificates against those estimates.
In plain language: you send us metadata about your organization's AI API usage (model names, token counts, regions, timestamps; never prompts or completions). We estimate the water, carbon, and energy footprint of that usage, and we purchase and retire verified environmental certificates against the estimate on your behalf: Water Restoration Certificates, verified carbon credits, and Renewable Energy Certificates. Each month you receive a certificate documenting exactly what was retired, and one consolidated invoice.
Tahosa Systems is a reseller and merchant of record. We are not a project developer, not a registry, and we never proxy, gate, or touch your actual AI traffic. If service lapses, your AI tools are unaffected.
2. How it works
- Metering. Usage arrives as metadata-only events. Content-shaped payloads are rejected at the API boundary; this is an architectural invariant, not a policy.
- Estimation. A versioned, public methodology (currently 1.0.0, published at /methodology) converts usage into footprint estimates. Every figure carries a stated 90 percent plausible range, and every estimate records the exact coefficient values used, so historical numbers remain reproducible. Covers the usage-phase (inference) footprint only. Excludes model training, hardware manufacturing beyond the amortized uplift described in the methodology, network transport, and end-user devices.
- Accrual. Estimates accrue as obligations in a double-entry ledger at the 90th percentile of the estimate range (P90) for every account, so the retired quantity plausibly meets or exceeds the estimate in nine cases out of ten. Accrual at P90 is labeled exactly that way, never as guaranteed coverage.
- Retirement. Each monthly close retires whole registry units against the accrued obligation: prepaid buffer inventory first, then supplier orders for any shortfall. Fractions carry forward. Certificates report confirmed retirements only; a funded order awaiting supplier confirmation stays in the ledger and is not available to support any public statement until confirmed.
- Documentation. The monthly certificate has four parts: the confirmed retirements with project identities; the estimate that sized them, with its range; required disclosures; and a summary of the claim language the record supports.
3. The nature of estimates
Footprint figures are modeled estimates generated by the versioned methodology. They are not measurements, they carry a stated plausible range that often spans more than an order of magnitude, and they are not suitable for regulatory, statutory, or assurance-standard reporting without independent review. Tahosa Systems warrants that the methodology was applied as published; it does not warrant that any estimate corresponds to actual physical consumption or emissions. The retirements themselves are exact: whole registry instruments, documented per certificate.
4. What you may say: the claim license
Customers receive a limited, revocable, non-exclusive, non-transferable license to reference their Certificates in their own communications, conditioned on using only the approved language in Schedule A and including the required disclosures in Schedule B. Statements outside Schedule A are outside the license. The approved claims are activity claims: they state what was funded and retired, identified by project and vintage. They are specific, verifiable, and documented, which is what survives regulatory and litigation scrutiny.
Schedule A: Approved claim language
| Surface | Approved template |
|---|---|
| Product description | Estimates the usage-phase environmental footprint of AI inference and retires verified environmental certificates against those estimates. |
| Water retirement | Retired {n} Water Restoration Certificates, representing {n x 1000} gallons of verified water restoration, through {supplier}. |
| Carbon retirement | Retired {n} verified carbon credits ({n} tCO2e), issued under {registry} as project {projectCode}, vintage {vintage}. |
| REC retirement | Purchased and retired {n} Renewable Energy Certificates ({n} MWh) from {resourceType} generation, vintage {vintage}. |
| Estimate disclaimer | Footprint figures are modeled estimates, not measurements. Central estimate {p50} {unit}; 90 percent plausible range {p05} to {p95}. Most providers do not disclose per-token energy, water, or emissions. Methodology {version}: {url} |
| Water geography | Water restoration occurs in the project watershed identified above, which may differ from the watersheds where AI infrastructure consumes water. |
| Scope note | Covers the usage-phase (inference) footprint only. Excludes model training, hardware manufacturing beyond the amortized uplift described in the methodology, network transport, and end-user devices. |
Schedule B: Required disclosures
| Disclosure | Renders when |
|---|---|
| Estimate range and disclaimer | Whenever any estimate figure is shown, in the same visual block. |
| Water geography statement | Whenever a water retirement figure is shown. |
| REC resource type and supplier Green-e or CRS disclosure | Whenever a REC figure is shown; never in the same block as any carbon quantity. |
| Carbon project identity (registry, project, vintage) | Whenever a carbon retirement is shown. |
| FTC 260.5 timing disclosure | When any retired credit funds a reduction occurring two or more years after purchase. |
| Unclassified-model disclosure | When unclassified model traffic exceeds 15 percent of period tokens. |
| Hidden-reasoning methodology note | When the hidden-reasoning multiplier applied to any usage in the period. |
| Not-an-audit statement | On every certificate. |
Prohibited claims
Customers will not state or imply that their AI usage, products, services, or organization is of neutral, reduced, or positive environmental impact on the basis of the service; will not describe any footprint as having been cancelled or neutralized; will not describe estimates as measurements; and will not describe the footprint estimate as verified or audited (verification attaches to the certificate record, never to the estimate). Prohibited phrasing includes, without limitation:
carbon neutral · carbon-neutral · climate neutral · co2 neutral · net zero · net-zero · zero emission · water neutral · water positive · net water positive · water balanced · footprint-free · impact-free · offsets your footprint · offsets your emissions · offset your · cancels out · neutralizes · compensates for · makes up for · zeroes out · nullifies · green ai · clean ai · sustainable ai · eco-friendly · environmentally friendly · climate friendly · guilt-free · 100 percent renewable ai · 100% renewable ai · we measure · measured footprint · actual footprint · exact footprint · verified footprint
5. One claim per attribute, no double counting
Each retired attribute may be claimed once, by the customer it was retired for, and in no other program, registry, framework response, or public statement. Customers will not claim attributes already claimed on their behalf by a cloud or model provider, and will disclose on request any provider-level renewable-energy or carbon claims covering the same consumption. One overlap deserves candor: if your model provider already reports its market-based emissions as zero by matching annual RECs, a separate REC retirement here covering the same consumption arguably claims the same megawatt hour twice. Our methodology uses location-based accounting partly for this reason, and we disclose the overlap rather than paper over it.
6. Retirement mechanics, pending orders, and water geography
Tahosa Systems purchases and retires credits in its own name for the customer's benefit; customers do not take title to or hold any certificate or registry instrument. Whether the supplier names the customer as beneficiary of record is stated per supplier relationship; where a supplier cannot, that limitation and its consequence for customer claims will be disclosed here before any sale.
A funded order awaiting supplier confirmation is exactly that: Funded; retirement pending supplier confirmation. Expected by the date shown in the console. Not yet available to support any public statement. If fulfillment fails, the remedy is substitution with credits of equal or better vintage and verification, or refund at the customer's election, within a stated window.
Water restoration occurs in the project watershed identified above, which may differ from the watersheds where AI infrastructure consumes water. Customers will not claim local or watershed-specific benefit absent project-specific support; water benefits are not hydrologically fungible across basins.
Certificate-share floor. At every monthly close, at least 50 percent of the period's subscription is spent acquiring verified environmental certificates: retired for the customer's benefit, or purchased into retirement buffer inventory where usage requires less. The achieved share is disclosed on each period's certificate. The floor is a spending commitment on the subscription price; it is not a representation about footprint coverage, which is governed by the estimate basis stated on the certificate.
7. Methodology changes; no restatement
The methodology may be revised prospectively, with notice and a public changelog. Retirements already executed are never reversed, and prior-period estimates are not recomputed, because credit retirement is irreversible. A revision that would have materially increased a prior obligation is disclosed, not back-billed.
8. California AB 1305
California law imposes independent website disclosure obligations on entities that purchase or use voluntary carbon offsets and make carbon-related environmental claims.Tahosa Systems publishes its own seller disclosures at /disclosures and makes project-level data available to customers, but does not assume customers' obligations. Staying within Schedule A is designed to avoid making the kinds of claims that trigger the buyer-side provision; that design intent is not a legal opinion, and customers should consult their own counsel.
9. Conformity, cure, and survival
Tahosa Systems may review customer public communications for conformity with Schedule A and require correction or retraction within a stated period, and may suspend the claim license and service for uncured breach. Customers indemnify Tahosa Systems against third-party claims arising from statements outside Schedule A. Retirements survive termination, certificates remain accurate as to their periods, and the Schedule A restrictions and no-double-counting covenant survive.
Questions: info@tahosasystems.com. This page renders its schedules from the same configuration that generates certificates and enforces the console's disclosures, and it updates with the methodology changelog.