Climate Impact X partners Puro.earth to stimulate demand, supply for tech-based carbon credits in Asia

TECH-based types of carbon credits will be coming to Temasek-backed carbon exchange and marketplace Climate Impact X (CIX) under its partnership with Puro.earth, a Nasdaq-owned startup focused solely on science-based carbon removal credits.

The collaboration, which was announced on Monday (Jun 6), means that Asia’s businesses and financial institutions can build carbon credit portfolios that map to the 2020-published Oxford Principles for Net Zero Aligned Carbon Offsetting, the parties said in a statement.

The principles recommend a progressive increase in the volume of long-term carbon removal and storage in the blend of credits used by corporates to reach their net-zero goals. A carbon credit represents a tonne of reduced or avoided greenhouse gas emissions.

So far, CIX, which is jointly established by DBS, the Singapore Exchange, Standard Chartered and Temasek, has been focusing on credits based off nature-based solutions that protect, restore and grow natural ecosystems like forests, mangroves and coastal habitats.

Puro.earth, on the other hand, offers technology-based carbon removal certificates, and pioneered the development of new carbon removal methodologies, including biochar, carbonated building materials and geologically stored carbon.

Biochar, which is produced from biomass or biowaste through pyrolysis, a process of heating in the absence of oxygen, is described as a “very stable, solid form” of carbon that can endure in soil for thousands of years. 

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This characteristic makes it an ideal technology for scalable carbon removal, CIX and Puro.earth said, adding that it has multiple commercial uses at potentially industrial volumes – as a greenhouse additive in soil regeneration and wastewater treatment, for instance.

On the partnership’s significance, CIX and Puro.earth noted that greater volume of long-term geochemical and chemical carbon removals in the blend of credits would support reaching the global net zero emission balance earlier.

This is because while biological, nature-based credits can deliver large-scale carbon removals, they cannot fully compensate for trade-offs in storage timescale and risk of reversal, they pointed out.

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CIX chief executive officer (CEO) Mikkel Larsen said the partnership came about as businesses are seeking products that are designed to be “net-zero aligned”.

“An appropriate mix of nature- and tech-based solutions helps to facilitate this. We need a blend of solutions to restore ecosystems as well as deliver broader socio-economic benefits for local communities,” he said.

Meanwhile, the partners noted that Puro.earth’s presence in Asia will make it easier for suppliers of carbon removal projects in the region to get credits issued under a standard that it had created – a first for engineered carbon removal methods. 

This will address an issue of supply, given that many permanent carbon removal projects are still in their infancy, Puro.earth CEO Antti Vihavainen said.

“We will continue to innovate and, together with leading scientists and organisations, to enable the best local ways to remove carbon in the Asia-Pacific region,” she added.