Dive Brief:
- Microsoft has signed a six-year offtake agreement with Catona Climate, a climate finance company, to purchase 350,000 tons of carbon removal credits generated through an agroforestry project based in Kenya, the companies announced Wednesday.
- The project is located in Homa Bay, near Lake Victoria, and collaborates with 15,000 local small-scale farmers to develop forest gardens — a multi-tiered combination of trees, shrubs and crops — on their land. Farmers also receive training on agroforestry, which improves agricultural yields without resorting to chemicals, and prevents deforestation and biodiversity loss.
- Catona said it partnered with nonprofit Trees for the Future to fund, design and manage the project. The carbon solutions company invested $21 million in the project last year, and estimates it will isolate over 4 million tons of carbon dioxide over a course of 20 years in the newly-planted trees and soil.
Dive Insight:
The collaboration with Catona builds on Microsoft’s goal to become carbon negative by 2030, and taps into a growing trend of corporations purchasing carbon removal credits to mitigate their carbon footprint.
Catona’s investment in the project has allowed TREES to design a program that enables a comprehensive approach to restoration and promotes the protection and enhancement of biodiversity across the region’s ecosystem. The project has also strengthened stakeholder engagement with municipalities, counties and national counterparts, according to the nonprofit.
“This collaboration demonstrates what's possible when like-minded stakeholders come together to align on project quality and impact," Rob Lee, Catona’s chief carbon officer, said in a press release. "There is no path to meeting Paris Agreement targets that doesn't involve carbon removals.”
Brian Marrs, Microsoft’s senior director for energy and carbon removal, added the agroforestry projects not only remove carbon but also “meaningfully support biodiversity and benefit local communities in the short and long term."
The deal is only the latest carbon removal venture to be inked by the software systems manufacturer. Last year, Microsoft signed a deal with Norwegian startup Inherit Carbon Solutions for carbon removal services through 2028. The startup employs a different approach to carbon removal by capturing carbon dioxide produced from converting organic food and water waste into renewable energy. This method not only addresses emissions but also contributes to responsible waste management, according to Inherit.
