A new generation of entrepreneurs is leveraging blockchain technology to revolutionize the financing of sustainability initiatives, with prominent supporters like Emurgo—a founding entity behind the eco-friendly Cardano blockchain—keen to advance this decentralized vision.

On May 7th, Changeblock, a carbon market technology startup backed by Emurgo Africa’s investment division, hosted a webinar focused on innovative sustainable blockchain solutions.

The webinar featured a lively discussion between Ahmed Amer, CEO of Emurgo Africa—a subsidiary backing Changeblock—and Billy Richards, founder and CEO of the carbon tech startup. Richards outlined Changeblock's ambitious plans to use blockchains like Cardano to create a transparent, liquid marketplace for trading high-integrity environmental assets such as carbon credits and funding sustainability projects.

Amer emphasized Emurgo's dedication to supporting blockchain solutions addressing climate change, offering valuable insights from the perspective of a key player in the Cardano ecosystem.

"Our investment in Changeblock reflects Emurgo's commitment to fostering climate change solutions on Cardano," said Amer. "Together, we aim to engage global leaders and changemakers in viable, monetizable strategies to achieve net zero emissions."

Using blockchain technologies in the carbon market could greatly enhance investments in carbon capture, renewable energy, reforestation, and more by treating certified emissions reductions as tradable commodities. The potential impact is significant.

"The climate finance market is expected to reach $1 trillion annually by 2030 as countries strive for net zero goals," stated Richards. "But inefficiencies and lack of standardization are hindering growth. We're unlocking this trillion-dollar opportunity by bringing environmental assets to the blockchain."

Overcoming Carbon Market Opaqueness with Blockchain

Changeblock's solutions focus on using blockchains like Cardano’s sustainable ledger to bring much-needed transparency, traceability, and legitimacy to the fragmented carbon credits ecosystem.

"Currently, there are no clear rules, which is why many organizations don't participate in carbon markets," Amer explained. "Blockchain provides the necessary monitoring, reporting, and verification layer where emissions data is verified by a decentralized network of validators, not just a single organization."

Changeblock integrates Internet of Things (IoT) sensors and oracles to feed raw emissions data onto Cardano's public blockchain. This data is then turned into non-fungible tokens (NFTs) representing verified emissions reductions or removals according to standardized methodologies.

These climate credits can be fractionalized, listed on Changeblock's decentralized exchange, and traded as liquid crypto tokens, ensuring transparency through the public blockchain, where anyone can audit the data behind each credit.

"It's like buying a Tesla share, where you can transparently see their output and production," said Amer. "With blockchain, the same transparency applies to climate credits, with market pricing directly reflecting measurable impacts."

DeFi for Climate Finance Innovation

Decentralized applications and platforms can use these tokenized environmental assets to create new financial products:

Crypto funds earning yields from investing in tokenized carbon projects
Fully on-chain carbon offsets for blockchain transaction emissions
Decentralized options, futures, and derivatives markets for hedging climate risk
Incentive programs rewarding individuals for verifiably reducing their carbon footprint

"We're turning sustainable actions into valuable, tradable assets that incentivize more climate solutions, offering institutions like banks and pension funds a new asset class to finance green development," said Richards. "DeFi plays a crucial role in this."

Looking forward, the Changeblock team envisions an interoperable future where global policy frameworks like the Paris Agreement's Article 6 connect environmental registries and traditional carbon markets directly to blockchains, creating unified liquidity for all certified climate assets.

As Richards concluded: "We aim to build the infrastructure to make financing sustainability profitable and seamlessly integrated into global markets and capital flows."

Though blockchain's role in tackling climate change is still nascent, pioneers like Changeblock and Emurgo are rapidly demonstrating the utility of decentralized ledgers and tokenization models for achieving significant environmental impacts at scale.