Global carbon ratings agency BeZero Carbon has partnered with the Earth Observation and Geoinformatics Division at Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research (INPE) to improve carbon estimates, especially around projects that claim to avoid deforestation and forest degradation.
A further partnership has been signed with the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM), which will see BeZero support Brazilian postgraduates working in the field of carbon research.
Brazil has more carbon credit projects claiming to avoid deforestation than any other country in the world – and these credits are bought, sold and traded on the Voluntary Carbon Market (VCM). The VCM has the potential to be a force for global change, channeling capital into some of the world’s most environmentally impactful solutions. But in order to scale to the level needed to become a transformative net zero solution the VCM needs more transparency, so market participants can determine whether projects are actually delivering on their environmental claims.
These partnerships aim to do just that – BeZero will support postgraduate research in Remote Sensing at INPE focused on carbon stocks in the Amazon rainforest. This work will combine carbon measured by scientists on the ground with data gathered from cutting-edge airborne LiDAR and satellite technologies. The results of the study will be used in BeZero’s ratings to improve transparency in the VCM.
BeZero collaborates with a range of partners to support global and regional carbon monitoring through data analytics and helping scientists and teams on the ground. These partnerships advance understanding of global carbon stocks through fieldwork and remote sensing.
This is just the latest development in BeZero’s geospatial work – which uses satellite imagery and other geospatial data, from space agencies, academic labs, national research institutions and industry partners, combined with BeZero Carbon’s market analysis to assess the efficacy of hundreds of carbon projects across the world.
Dr Camila Silva, Remote Sensing Ecologist at BeZero and Researcher at IPAM: “The Voluntary Carbon Market needs greater transparency to scale. It is therefore essential to accurately map the amount of carbon stored in forests, and to understand how these stocks are impacted by human activities. These partnerships will help improve and advance remote sensing estimates and measuring capabilities, which in turn will support BeZero’s ratings and risk analysis.”
Dr Luiz Aragao, lead scientist at the INPE, said: “We are pleased to be partnering with BeZero Carbon to support a high level of training of Brazilian postgraduates on the development of scientific methods for improving carbon stocks quantification. The partnership is key for supporting long-term monitoring of existing field plots and expanding our assessments into the highest areas of carbon uncertainty – so we can continue to provide accurate estimations of carbon stocks and dynamics across Brazil.”
