We are very excited to announce a partnership between recarb and the ERS which seeks to establish consolidated due diligence processes for nature investments against ERS' state-of-the-art standard for ecosystem restoration. The partnership enables investors to certify to understand the risks and opportunities associated with the nature-based projects they invest in.
The scope of the partnership currently covers the three most deforested Brazilian biomes: the Amazon, Cerrado and the Atlantic Forest. Regardless of the size of the restoration project, the partnership makes it possible to accurately determine the probability of project success whilst simultaneously detailing all potential risks during the project design phase.
The Ecosystem Restoration Standard (ERS) offers a rigorous standard that goes beyond traditional carbon assessment, ensuring that the outcomes of ecosystem restoration efforts are resilient in the long run. It’s three pillar approach (ecological recovery, carbon and livelihoods) ensures all certified projects achieve high integrity across the board.
Ecosystem restoration is a highly specialised and localised field whose value chain is still incipient in most countries. Despite following processes, regulations and safeguards, developing and implementing projects can pose significant risks encompassing project viability, financial considerations, and, most importantly, the intricacies of local realities. Evolving environmental regulations and land-use policies introduce additional risk, necessitating adaptive strategies for compliance. In addition, unintended consequences on local biodiversity, potential community resistance, and uncertainties linked to climate variability should also be anticipated, valued and monitored.
In alignment with the ERS’ standard, recarb, a nature tech start-up, has developed a fully automated due diligence to address risks for five different restoration strategies: natural regeneration, assisted natural regeneration, enrichment planting, consortium planting and direct sowing. The indicators and scoring methodology are rooted in 30 years of biome-specific best practices and all the academic research. With 254 different criteria, recarb is able to rate the likelihood of success of any project in the project design document (PDD) across the three most vulnerable biomes in Brazil.
Once all the necessary data is collected, Recarb utilizes a standardised process that allows project developers and companies to conduct thorough due diligence in only 3 hours, summarizing risks and improvement recommendations in a detailed report. Recarb provides full transparency about the risks of each project phase from initial assessment to maintenance - using a science-based approach to help effectively rate and monitor restoration projects that promote better ecosystem resilience.
The partnership between recarb and ERS helps companies investing in nature speed up due diligence and reduce risk. In their joint mission of scaling nature-based solutions - a fundamental piece in the global puzzle of safeguarding biodiversity and achieving net zero - recarb and ERS hope to raise the bar by encouraging the use of rigorous scientific approaches on restoration projects in Brazil.
