Decarbonization as a Service

At the center of net zero is a knowledge problem: How do we know when we’ve gotten to net zero? Answering this question is surprisingly hard.

Companies large and small have begun to build “platforms” that promise to help organizations meet their net-zero promises. These platforms claim to be able to deliver “decarbonization-as-a-service” through the use of digital technologies that effectively track carbon. They are racing ahead of law and policy and performing de facto governance, creat... See more

We wouldn’t just be entrusting the platforms with data, however. We would also be entrusting them to play a major role in the governance of ecosystems, with significant social consequences.

A final problem with a market-based system is that it turns the platforms themselves into black boxes. As profit-seeking enterprises, they must protect their algorithms and data, as otherwise their competitors might gain an advantage. But this opacity obstructs the learning and experimentation process that’s required to combat climate change.

Veritree is in its early days, but it hopes to become “an operating system for the restoration economy,” in Emsley’s words. An “Initial Tree Offering” was used to raise money for a “First Edition Forest,” which features trees in Madagascar, Indonesia, Nepal, Kenya, Senegal, and Haiti. The appeal for corporations hoping to make good on their net-zer... See more

Under such an arrangement, countries are free to continue burning fossil fuels, so long as they offset their emissions. For this reason, many climate advocates have been critical of net zero as a goal. One common critique is that net-zero pledges won’t stop the continued extraction and combustion of fossil fuels. Further, they’re aimed at a future ... See more

We must build data infrastructures that embody multiple ways of knowing and understanding our world, and that help us advance both ecological and social ends, before corporations conquer this space for themselves.

Net zero is still a worthwhile transitional goal, because we don’t yet have all the technologies we need at scale for true climate repair. Climate change is a problem of stocks, not flows: we need not only to stop emitting carbon by switching to renewables, but to reduce the existing levels of carbon in our atmosphere. Net zero alone won’t get us t... See more

The knowability of net zero can’t be taken for granted, then. All those policymakers and executives are making net-zero pledges without a clue for how to see them through. How can these pledges possibly be fulfilled? How can the knowledge problem of net zero be solved?