The
Carbonfuture Story
If climate change is making you feel bad, you’re not alone. We decided to invest in making a massive handprint of positive change: Trusted carbon removal in the gigatonne range.
Become Part of the StorySo, How Did It All Start?
Early 2019, Hans-Peter Schmidt from the ithaka institute and Hansjörg Lerchenmüller from Carbuna AG shared their thoughts to address the shortcomings of existing carbon offset markets with us. From an abstract scientific perspective, Hans-Peter's groundbreaking idea of carbon sink leasing inspired us immediately. We started to think about a scalable framework for carbon sink financing as the backbone of a re-thought economy in which the fight against global warming is rewarded properly.
In summer 2019, we presented the academic results complemented by a proof of concept blockchain-based implementation on the IBI study tour in Finland, and some weeks later on the symposium of the German Fachverband Pflanzenkohle. The concept turned out to be so convincing that we decided to take it serious. We then started implementing the framework front to back in close collaboration with pioneering people from the young biochar sector, from finance, academia, IT and corporates willing to balance their emissions. As of January 2020, we have actually created the first fully documented and verified biochar based carbon sinks which fulfil the quality criteria needed to become a commercially viable financing instrument.
Leadership Team
Team
Our Advisory Board
Hansjörg Lerchenmüller,
Advisor Deputy of the Chairman
Physicist by education, Hansjörg founded a company producing highly efficient photovoltaic modules. As winner of the prestigious Deutscher Umweltpreis, he is now active as business angel, investor and consultant for established companies and start-ups contributing to climate protection. He recently founded the European Biochar Industry Consortium and serves as chairman of the Board of Carbuna AG.
Elena Walder-Schiavone
Elena is Co-Founder and Managing Director of Übermorgen Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm for climate tech start-ups.
Before she worked as a lawyer in large M&A teams of renowned law firms and in 2012 specialized in legal advice for start-ups as one of the first lawyers in Switzerland with her own law firm SMART UP LAW. She has accompanied more than 100 transactions and capital increases.
Her professional background, various engagements as business angel and member of the board of various start-up companies as well as mentor in different mentorship programs, such as PwC Scale and Founders' Institute, allow Elena to assist the Company with all kinds of strategic, business and legal-related advice.
Alexander Kölpin
Alexander is an experienced early-stage investor and Managing Director of the seed+speed Ventures investment fund in Berlin. For many years he served as Managing Director at the technology-oriented seed investor WestTech Ventures, co-founded the Berlin Web Week, as well as the seed investor German Startups Group Berlin AG, where he also acted as board member.
Prior to this he helped establish new start-ups in Berlin and worked as a management consultant at inubit AG (Bosch Software Innovations) and Arthur Andersen.
Alexander holds academic degrees in Economics, European Studies and Sociology.
Dirk Paessler
Dirk is a true serial-entrepreneur; he founded and serves as chairman of Paessler AG, an international monitoring software firm, which he also lead in the role of CEO for 20 years. He most recently established and serves as Chief Executive Officer of Carbon Drawdown Initiative GmbH, a climate startup that holds investments in Climeworks, 4401.earth and others. The company initiated "Project Carbdown", a scientific research program to help understand and quantify Enhanced Weathering.
He is also the co-founder and VP of Negative Emissions Platform, a policy organization dedicated to promoting CDR on an EU-wide level.
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