When we think about reforestation projects as an instrumental part of combating climate change and curbing our global emissions many tend to discount the priority we should put on scaling the most proven asset we have in carbon sequestration – trees.Â
For us to draw down the equivalent of ~200 Gigatons of CO2 through planting trees we would need the equivalent of 1 Trillion Trees to be planted. This paired with ongoing electrification efforts and carbon avoidance technologies popping up can help us begin to move the needle towards pre-industrial revolution era CO2 PPM (parts per million).
Quantifying the 1 Trillion Tree Goal...
It’s ambitious, but broken down 1 Trillion Trees is in fact possible. As demonstrated by Yishan – the CEO of Terraformation – in the above-linked blog post, reaching 1 Trillion Trees needs a mixture of growth strategies paired with technology to make the supply chain 10x more efficient.
Enter Terraformation:
Terraformation is working on fighting climate change through scaling reforestation efforts. Their team starts at the ground level for reforestation projects, where they come to assess the land, plan out what seeds and native trees are in the region, plan and monitor using their apps and sustain and scale projects through financing mechanisms such as carbon offsets.
Market Need:
Reforestation in general is critical if we’re to win the climate fight. However, the scale at which we’ll be able to plant trees is one of the limiting barriers to making reforestation a top priority among climate solutions that can draw down carbon. Terraformation helps address those concerns and with the capital backing that they have and from the capital coming from their ongoing crowdfunding campaign it seems they are on the proper path to enabling a global movement that inspires other organizations to leverage the processes they are laying out to scale reforestation efforts.
Future Outlook:
What makes Terraformation even more interesting to explore is the discussion around how to finance these massive projects. Carbon offsets actually seem to be only one angle to take here. Terraformation partnered up with Frontier Economics to produce a report that actually breaks down the business opportunity in trees.Â
As mentioned in the podcast episode – trees are good business and there may soon be a future where you can purchase bonds issued by reforestation projects.
About The Author
Swarnav has over 10 years of experience in the energy & climate tech space, holds 2 patents and is active in the tech, climate and media industries. He specializes in Product/Product Innovation as well as Go-To-Market and Growth Strategy.
By training he’s a Materials Engineer with a background in research from his time at Georgia Tech and University of Illinois (UIUC).
He founded TouchLight a utility backed energy company focused on developing IP for utilities and startups pushing electrification forward. He also serves as the appointed Chairman for the Town of Yorktown’s Climate Smart Communities Task Force, where he helps with drafting legislation and enabling sustainability efforts within the town.
Concurrently, Swarnav founded The Impact to help investors, emerging founders and driven climate enthusiasts discover and identify new climate-tech startups, technologies and opportunities before they hit the traditional media sources.