Evergrow launches today as the world’s first carbon offtake company, acting as both an offtaker and funding provider for projects that avoid, reduce, or remove carbon emissions.
Traditional banks require developers to have offtake contracts in order to receive funding, but offtake contracts are rare in the carbon markets. By providing both carbon offtake agreements and capital for carbon reduction projects, Evergrow streamlines the carbon finance process and accelerates the transition to a carbon-neutral economy.
The team also announced a $7M seed round, one of the largest seed rounds for climate tech companies in 2021. The round was co-led by XYZ Venture Capital and Congruent Ventures, with participation from First Round Capital, Garuda Ventures, MCJ Collective, Skyview Ventures, and notable individuals from the carbon, technology, and asset management industries, including Zach Perrett (CEO, Plaid), Max Mullen (Co-founder, Instacart), Peter Reinhardt (CEO, Charm Industrial), Michael Tanenbaum (CFO, Brex), Maddie Hall (CEO, Living Carbon), and Karen Karniol-Tambour (Co-CIO for Sustainability Investing, Bridgewater Associates).
“We must immediately begin deploying massive amounts of capital into projects that reduce, remove, or avoid carbon emissions in order to combat climate change,” said James Richards, co-founder and CEO, Evergrow. “By bringing long-term offtake contracts to the carbon markets, we provide price certainty and unlock capital for these vital projects. ”
Over 20% of global carbon emissions are now subject to regulatory and voluntary limits as a result of government action and public pressure. As a result, carbon is now an internationally traded commodity. The aggregate value of the global carbon market exceeded $272B in 2020, representing more than 20% year-over-year growth. Many analysts expect this rate of growth to accelerate into the future. Meeting the growing demand for carbon reduction will require new financial infrastructure to channel capital toward carbon reduction projects at high velocity and large scale.
“One of the biggest challenges holding back efforts to reduce carbon emissions is a dearth of project-level data and developer tooling,” said Luke Whiting, co-founder and president, Evergrow. “We are excited to apply our deep enterprise data and software expertise to ensure that developers of carbon projects have the resources to be more effective and productive.”
Founded in 2021, Evergrow’s mission is to ensure our future on Earth by enabling and accelerating every project that reduces humanity’s carbon footprint. The company is led by a team of Silicon Valley veterans with experience across climate finance, data, regulatory and risk. James Richards, co-founder and CEO, was named as a ‘Forbes 30 Under 30’, and is a 2nd-time founder, former Wall Street lawyer, and investor in early-stage technology, energy, and decarbonization companies. Luke Whiting, co-founder and President, brings deep data and software expertise as former founding COO of Clearbit, a leading business data and market intelligence company, and member of the founding team at You.com, an artificial intelligence company.
“At XYZ, we believe that efforts to combat climate change need to go faster,” said Ross Fubini, Founder & Managing Partner, XYZ Venture Capital. “To that end, I encourage every developer of carbon offsets, low carbon fuel standard credits, or other carbon and environmental attributes to reach out and explore a partnership with Evergrow.”