Save the Amazon, Save the World — How Treebr is Working to Offset the Carbon Footprint
By: Security Token Market
Tags: Carbon Credits, Sto, Finance, Esg, Security Token

Save the Amazon, Save the World — How TreeBR is Working to Offset the Carbon Footprint

Recently, Jonah Schulman Head of Communications at Security Token Market had the opportunity to interview the TreeBR team & Kyle Fry of Digital Markets to discuss carbon credits and the upcoming TreeBR IPO!

👇Watch the interview here👇

As the world has been innovating through the modern-day technological revolution, many companies sacrifice all else for their top priority: money.

Hiring overseas labor for pennies on the dollar, disposing of waste wherever they see fit, and emitting immense amounts of carbon barely scratches the surface of some of their unethical practices. Unfortunately, they do not often consider the ramifications of their complete disregard for environmental sustainability. The United Nations recently concluded that the world must be carbon neutral by 2050. Trees in the Amazon Rainforest remain the best source of these desperately needed carbon stores.

The Amazon Rainforest covers 4% of the world yet is responsible for over 35% of global carbon absorption. Due to deforestation from industrial agriculture, timber logging, mining, expansion, and more, this capability has become ever-threatened. Whether for better or worse, humans do not get a second chance to keep Earth a place of quaint beauty and a garden of prosperity.

One company is fighting to be different: TreeBR.

With sustainability at the forefront of their goals, TreeBR supports Amazon Rainforest landowners by facilitating their ability to sell carbon offsets (equivalent to a carbon credit) removal units as an alternative form of sustainable monetization to deforestation. Operating over 960 million square feet of trees (20,000 American football fields), they are looking to expand and concurrently offer an opportunity never seen before.

Working with third-party engineers, TreeBR verifies carbon credits and lists them on global carbon markets, making one’s purchase both valuable and tradable. All too often, these types of investments are limited to accredited investors, leaving out potentially lucrative opportunities for retail investors. TreeBR ensures that all investors, regardless of net worth, income, or a host of other factors, are allowed to invest. This contributes to their overall mission of achieving a high level of corporate social responsibility — a critical consideration for companies that wish to succeed in an ever-changing social climate.

With the guidance of Digital Markets, a powerhouse in the digital securities universe, TreeBR will be launching a global security token offering (STO) on the MERJ Exchange as $TREE. TreeBR will eventually rely on Rule 144 for US retail investors, which would permit unregistered public resale of restricted and controlled securities within certain limits post a one-year lock-up from its Reg D 506(c) offering, and international retail investors from around the world rely on Reg S, made available on MERJ Exchange subject to final approvals — TreeBR has created a universal investment opportunity free of traditional barriers.

Listing via a security token provides many unique advantages that traditional markets do not. Kyle Sonlin, CEO of Security Token Market, explains some of the benefits:

“Security tokens unlock the true potential of asset ownership by capitalizing on many new and unique opportunities not afforded in the public markets. Global interoperability allows for the democratization of investments by the global audience on a 24/7 timeframe while benefiting from enhanced liquidity through cross-listing of exchanges to meet the varied compliance requirements and user experience demands of users worldwide. On top of that, tokenization technology drastically reduces settlement costs, both through saving literal dollars and through immediate settlement, removing the opportunity for intermediaries to capitalize on float and inefficiencies in the capital markets infrastructure. Beyond the basics, tokenization enables new and unique features — airdrops, communal voting, user engagement, exclusive access, and unique rewards and identifiers are all possible for the first time. Even staking and collateralization, something that once appeared exclusive to the crypto community, is possible through security token technology, allowing investors to receive enhanced liquidity and leverage options that are only accessed by dark pools and the smallest fraction of asset owners today. This industry is inspiring in its rapid growth and mission-oriented direction. Each and every day, it becomes more apparent that this technology will become a revolutionary application for blockchain that will redefine how we observe and interact with the capital markets forever.”

An investment in TreeBR is intended to provide twofold benefits. First, Kyle Fry, President and Co-founder of Digital Markets, ensures that $TREE will be “priced to be a successful offering.” Through the inherent deflationary nature of carbon, one could surmise that demand will far exceed supply as time goes on. For an investor, this would make their tokens increasingly valuable. Secondly, this carbon credit is an investment product to offset one’s carbon footprint by providing capital to carbon positive operations and the retirement will be tracked on an immutable public blockchain ledger.

Let’s explore this further:

Many landowners in the Amazon Rainforest are actively working to enrich their land to absorb more carbon, achieving a ‘carbon positive’ status and contributing to environmental sustainability efforts.

There are many carbon emitters from around the world, which damage the atmosphere with excessive carbon emissions and thus are coined ‘carbon negative.'

These Amazon Rainforest landowners will be able to offer digital shares that represent carbon credits.

So, what does this mean?

If the powerplant negatively affects the atmosphere with one ton of carbon per year (hypothetically speaking), the Amazon Rainforest landowners can offer a carbon credit that matches the one ton of carbon. The proceeds from the carbon credit are reinvested into the Amazon project, therefore, offsetting the carbon negative impact.

There are two reasons why this practice should be considered for widespread adoption. The first is that many individuals would like to offset their negative carbon footprint, which can be done by purchasing carbon credits. Additionally, some jurisdictions impose carbon emission restrictions, so carbon credits provide a way to minimize net carbon output.

Some current skepticism within the carbon credit market lies in the unknown. Until now, trust and transparency were hard to find within the industry, and it was nearly impossible to verify where carbon credit proceeds were going. However, due to the blockchain technology that TreeBR is utilizing, every transaction is trackable, thereby tracking both ownership as well as issuance and retirement on an immutable public ledger. This is a huge accomplishment because now as an investor you no longer have to trust the issuer to tell you where the carbon credit is retired — investors can now track it on the blockchain every step of the way.

In addition, Marcelo Bastos (one of the first landowners to join the alliance) and Ricardo Carvalho (CEO of TreeBR), boast decades of risk management and understanding of the Brazilian business and regulatory environment Whether competing in the Olympics for Brazil (3 times), working ~30 years in IT at IBM, or mastering the finance world, this duo is relentless in their pursuit of preserving Earth’s beauty and providing an investment opportunity like none other to investors around the world.