Removing Gigatons of CO₂ and Empowering Smallholder Farmers with Circonomy's Biochar Initiative
Adrien Humbert
CEO & Co-Founder
Circonomy
What inspired you to embark on the journey of creating Circonomy?
Circonomy was born from two significant encounters. The first occurred 3 years ago when I had the opportunity to be involved in a project aiming at identifying synergies between industries in an Agri-food park to close material loops. It was during this time that I delved deeper into the concept of circular economy, which advocates for a system where materials never become waste and nature is regenerated. I became passionate about this approach.
The second pivotal encounter happened 1 year later when Kul Kauwid and I met in a start-up accelerator program. Sharing the same motivations, we focused on one of the biggest challenges faced by agriculture in the Tropics. In the regions, smallholder farmers often resort to burning their crop waste in their fields, resulting in significant GHG emissions and environmental damages. Circonomy was founded to help these farmers transition to more sustainable practices and harness the potential to remove gigatons of CO2 from the atmosphere each year.
How does Circonomy address climate change and empower local communities, while enhancing food security resilience?
One of the challenges we faced when starting was how to finance our projects. Carbon credits emerged as a solution, but we had to build trust with Net-Zero pledging companies who would purchase those credits. We’ve developed a smartphone application-based system to monitor the carbon journey from crop waste to carbon sink. Through this application, every step of the process is tracked, providing proof of work and data to calculate the exact amount of CO₂ removed, while considering emissions throughout the entire life cycle.
When a company purchases 1 ton of CO₂, they are assured that 1 ton has been effectively removed, along with additional co-benefits. Moreover, they have transparency regarding where the carbon removal occurred, the production location of the biochar, the feedstock used, and its origin. Building trust is vital to channel carbon finance into our projects, enabling us to scale up biochar adoption, significantly contributing to the removal of gigatons of CO₂ from the atmosphere and strengthening food security.
Could you share specific innovative approaches or practices employed by Circonomy that exemplify their commitment to creating a sustainable future?
One of the challenges we faced when starting was how to finance our projects. Carbon credits emerged as a solution, but we had to build trust with Net-Zero pledging companies who would purchase those credits. We’ve developed a smartphone application-based system to monitor the carbon journey from crop waste to carbon sink. Through this application, every step of the process is tracked, providing proof of work and data to calculate the exact amount of CO₂ removed, while considering emissions throughout the entire life cycle.
When a company purchases 1 ton of CO₂, they are assured that 1 ton has been effectively removed, along with additional co-benefits. Moreover, they have transparency regarding where the carbon removal occurred, the production location of the biochar, the feedstock used, and its origin. Building trust is vital to channel carbon finance into our projects, enabling us to scale up biochar adoption, significantly contributing to the removal of gigatons of CO₂ from the atmosphere and strengthening food security.
