Latest news with #carbonremoval
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
JPMorgan Just Sparked a $210M Green Finance Revolution--Here's What It Means for Carbon Markets
JPMorgan (NYSE:JPM) has just structured something that could change how carbon markets get fundedstarting with a $210 million loan for Chestnut Carbon. In a deal that applies traditional project finance to a carbon-credit developer for the first time in the U.S., Chestnut will use the funds to deliver long-term nature-based carbon removal credits to Microsoft under a 25-year contract. The forestry projects in Arkansas and Texas have already seen over 17 million trees planted since 2022. JPMorgan, joined by a group of smaller lenders, is betting that this modelnon-recourse and cash-flow-backedcould make carbon projects more bankable and draw in long-missing institutional investors. Warning! GuruFocus has detected 8 Warning Sign with JPM. The carbon credit market has long been stuck in a chicken-and-egg trap: investors want scale, but developers need capital to get there. Chestnut's CFO Greg Adams believes this debt-based structure may finally break that cycle. Instead of relying on equity or philanthropyas most projects still dothis structure could reduce the cost of capital and make room for infrastructure funds and mainstream financiers. JPMorgan's Vijnan Batchu echoed that view, saying giving developers runway at a better financing cost is key to delivering meaningful impact. The hope is that this model doesn't stay a one-off. While it's still early, the move may hint at a broader shift. Nancy Pfund of DBL Partners, an investor in Chestnut, noted that while this one loan doesn't solve the market's broader capital gap, it could be a turning point. If more deals like this follow, the voluntary carbon marketoften dismissed as too small to mattermight start to look like a serious asset class. And if Chestnut's partnership with Microsoft proves scalable, carbon removal could finally gain the financial muscle it needs to grow. This article first appeared on GuruFocus.
The Independent
7 days ago
- Business
- The Independent
Microsoft announces deal to purchase 4.9 million metric tons of human waste
Microsoft has announced a deal to purchase 4.9 million metric tons of durable carbon dioxide removal from Vaulted Deep. The agreement, spanning 12 years from next year, involves Vaulted Deep injecting 'bioslurry' – a mix of human and farm waste – 5,000 feet underground. This method aims to permanently sequester carbon and address problematic organic waste that typically causes environmental issues above ground. The initiative is part of Microsoft 's broader strategy to offset its significant carbon footprint, which has been exacerbated by its ventures into artificial intelligence. Microsoft aims to become carbon negative by 2030 and remove more greenhouse gases than it has emitted since its founding by 2050.
Yahoo
7 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Microsoft is buying tons of carbon removal from Xprize startup Vaulted Deep
Microsoft is building data centers as fast as it can, and that's killing its carbon balance sheet. Since 2020, its carbon emissions have grown by nearly a quarter, undermining the pledge it made that year to remove more carbon from the atmosphere than it generates by 2030. So Microsoft has been buying massive amounts of carbon-removal credits to attempt to remedy that situation, including a newly announced purchase of 4.9 million metric tons from Vaulted Deep. Neither party disclosed the financial terms of the deal. It will last 12 years through 2028. Vaulted Deep operates like a reverse oil company. It collects solid waste — like treated sewage, excess manure, or paper sludge — that would otherwise be headed for a landfill or incinerator, blends it into a slurry, and injects it into porous rocks deep underground. The wells are drilled and pores opened using technology developed for fracking oil and gas. So far, Vaulted Deep has removed over 18,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide. The company was a runner up in the Xprize Carbon competition, and it raised a $32 million Series A in November that was led by Prelude Ventures. Recently, Microsoft has been stuck between a rock and a hard place to make good on its imperiled carbon pledge. While the tech company has been investing heavily in renewable power — avoiding emissions is considered the appropriate first step — there are some things it must use, like semiconductors, for which there are no zero-greenhouse-gas alternatives. Last year, Microsoft generated 14.9 million metric tons worth of greenhouse gas emissions, it said, more than double what it hopes to be producing in 2030, when it plans on reaching negative carbon emissions. To hit it's goal, the company has recently been ramping up its investments in carbon removal. Among them are a 7 million metric ton deal with Chestnut Carbon to reforest 60,000 acres in the Southeastern U.S. and another for 3.7 million metric tons with CO280 to capture carbon from paper mill operations along the Gulf Coast. Sign in to access your portfolio
TechCrunch
7 days ago
- Business
- TechCrunch
Microsoft is buying tons of carbon removal from Xprize startup Vaulted Deep
Microsoft is building data centers as fast as it can, and that's killing its carbon balance sheet. Since 2020 its carbon emissions have grown by nearly a quarter, undermining the pledge it made that year to remove more carbon from the atmosphere than it generates by 2030. So Microsoft has been buying massive amounts of carbon removal credits to attempt to remedy that situation, including a newly announced purchase of 4.9 million metric tons from Vaulted Deep. Neither party disclosed the financial terms of the deal. It will last 12 years through 2028. Vaulted Deep operates like a reverse oil company. It collects solid waste that would otherwise be headed for a landfill or incinerator like treated sewage, excess manure, or paper sludge, blends it into a slurry, and injects it into porous rocks deep underground. The wells are drilled and pores opened using technology developed for fracking oil and gas. So far, Vaulted Deep has removed over 18,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide. The company was a runner up in the Xprize Carbon competition, and it raised a $32 million Series A in November that was led by Prelude Ventures. Recently, Microsoft has been stuck between a rock and a hard place to make good on its imperiled carbon pledge. While the tech company has been investing heavily in renewable power — avoiding emissions is considered the appropriate first step — there are some things it must use, like semiconductors, for which there are no zero-greenhouse-gas alternatives. Last year, Microsoft generated 14.9 million metric tons worth of greenhouse gas emissions, it said, more than double what it hopes to be producing in 2030, when it plans on reaching negative carbon emissions. To hit it's goal, the company has recently been ramping up its investments in carbon removal. Among them are a 7 million metric ton deal with Chestnut Carbon to reforest 60,000 acres in the Southeastern U.S. and another for 3.7 million metric tons with CO280 to capture carbon from paper mill operations along the Gulf Coast.
The Independent
7 days ago
- Business
- The Independent
Microsoft wants to use human poop to lower its vast carbon footprint
Microsoft is looking to lower its vast carbon footprint by pumping human waste 5,000 feet below the ground's surface. The tech giant hopes to offset its massive carbon footprint, only exacerbated by its ventures into artificial intelligence, by using an unusual greenhouse gas removal strategy. On Thursday, Microsoft announced a deal to purchase 4.9 million metric tons of durable carbon dioxide removal from Vaulted Deep. The company's 'bioslurry,' or mix of human and farm waste, is injected deep underground – in exchange for carbon credits. Microsoft's purchase will span 12 years, starting next year. For each ton of carbon they shuttle deep underground, they will receive a carbon removal credit. 'We're taking different types of organic waste,' Julia Reichelstein, the co-founder and chief executive of Vaulted Deep, told the Journal. 'It's sludgy, often contaminated organic waste that today causes problems above ground, and instead we take the waste and put it really deep underground for permanent carbon removal,' Reichelstein added. The waste used by Vaulted Deep is typically a slurry, not quite solid, liquid, or gas. Traditionally, this type of waste is difficult to treat and often ends up being left in fields, leading to nutrient runoff and the spread of PFAS, or "forever chemicals," into water systems. Vaulted Deep, however, takes the slurry and pipes it deep under natural rock formations. The company then sells carbon credits based on the amount of carbon it stores below the ground. They currently sell for about $350 a metric ton, according to the report. Companies like Microsoft, which emitted 75.5 million tons of CO2 from 2020 to 2024, hope that storing organic waste thousands of feet underground will help them meet their emission targets. Microsoft has a goal of becoming carbon negative by 2030, and by 2050, hopes to remove more greenhouse gases than the company has emitted since its founding. To date, Microsoft has bought many carbon removal credits. It has acquired more than 83 million tons of carbon removal, of which 59 million tons have been bought so far this year, not including the deal with Vaulted Deep, according to the report. Brian Marrs, the tech giant's senior director of energy and carbon removal, touted the investment in Vaulted Deep as being mutually beneficial. 'They're essentially taking biosolids, and much of that today is spread over fields,' he said. 'It can create nutrient [runoff] and other pollutants for watersheds, and sealing out that biosolid where it can't be a nuisance to the environment and where it will not repatriate carbon into the atmosphere – that approach, that co-benefits approach is very, very interesting to us.'
