As carbon emissions damage our planet, many startups are trying different ways to absorb carbon dioxide. A common method is building machines. But what if we use what we have already: trees? After all, roughly 30% of the total land on Earth is forest.
This is the approach Sassan Saatchi, a senior scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, is taking. He leads CTrees, a nonprofit organization that uses AI to track how much carbon is in every tree in the world. with satellite images from space agencies and private organizations. This method is backed by the last 20 years of science and is close in terms of accuracy to ground measurements.
There are other startups, such as San Francisco-based Pachama, also use AI and remote sensing to track carbon offset in forests. But CTrees is taking a look at the global picture. Saatchi’s platform can also examine data from specific regions. High-resolution data make it possible to zero in on individual trees.
The data CTrees is generating will help countries that depend on forests to absorb enough carbon to meet their recommended levels as outlined in the Paris Climate Agreement. Companies that sell carbon credits for protecting forests will also find the nonprofit’s platform helpful to convince buyers that they’re really measuring the value of their work.
Annual forest data from CTrees will be available for free to the public on the website. Customers can pay to have carbon measurements done for certain projects.
Trees: A Nature-Given Solution
Last year, researchers estimate that trees stored around 400 billion tons of carbon globally. CTree’s data can encourage people and companies to rely on trees as natural carbon absorbers without exploiting their abilities.
References:
https://climatetrace.org/news/conversations-with-the-coalition-sassan-saatchi
https://www.fastcompany.com/90789651/a-nasa-scientist-designed-a-platform-to-track-the-carbon-of-every-tree-on-the-planet
