Plant Trees to Remove Carbon
For individuals who want to remove their carbon emissions and support the world’s most holistic nature based solutions.
Photo by Louise Jasper.
TREE PLANTING FAQs
How do you quantify the carbon benefits of projects, the carbon sequestration and uptake by the trees planted?
Plan Vivo sets the base for ensuring best practice. A good example is CommuniTree. There are three strands to this. The project works out how much carbon (on average) will be stored over the course of 50 years from the trees planted on farmers’ land. The carbon models CommuniTree uses have been created by a team of PHDs and reviewed by Plan Vivo’s technical advisory committee (Plan Vivo TAC). The TAC is made up of forestry experts and scientists. All of the technical specifications and carbon projections are outlined in public documentation.
Second, CommuniTree’s team of local experts provide ongoing monitoring and forestry assessments as the trees grow. These are at the level of individual farmer families’ land. Following best practice forest measurement techniques, they calculate the carbon stored on the farms over time. The project is assessed by an independent third party auditor to verify the results being reported. In the last assessment, conducted by the Rainforest Alliance, the CommuniTree program was awarded “Best Monitoring and Evaluation” for its leading approach. The monitoring results from each year are made public in annual reports each of which can be downloaded on individual project pages.
Finally, CommuniTree’s innovative proprietary software, FARM-TRACE, combines mobile monitoring on the ground with satellite data and uses machine learning to provide continuous reporting on carbon uptake and other impacts. Their interactive tool makes it possible to track the impacts being made in near real time across every farm where trees are being grown. You can see FARM-TRACE on the CommuniTree project page.
How are Plan Vivo projects different to other types of offsetting projects? How are the projects developed with the local community, putting their views and needs at the centre?
Plan Vivo means Living Plan. Every project has these living plans at the heart of the project. They are developed through a collaborative process with the local community. By design, each project has to put local needs at the centre. It takes time. The local people are involved from the very beginning and have control over decision making which means that these projects have a truly sustainable future. You cannot plant trees without ensuring you have a Living Plan or equivalent that ensures people and nature work together and are funded for years and decades to come. That’s what the projects are about.
CommuniTree, for example, has grown from a phone call and a vision ten years ago to the biggest reforestation programme in the whole of Nicaragua. That is for many important reasons, including the support it receives from C Level clients. But most important is the enthusiasm of and agency given to more and more local communities taking part.
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ABOUT C LEVEL
C Level provides you with the best way to offset your carbon footprint – bringing together the natural powers of ecosystems and local communities to take CO2 out of the Earth’s atmosphere and bring it down to earth. Credited with coining the term ‘carbon footprint’ in 2000, C Level works with some of the world’s finest reforestation projects – sequestering CO2 via indigenous forests with local communities. These natural climate solutions are verified under the global Plan Vivo Standard, which puts working with communities, on their own land, right at the heart of its work.
C Level gives you the choice of sustainable carbon offsets that compensate for each tonne of CO2, provide biodiversity benefits and engage local communities in forest restoration and conservation.
You will receive a personal certificate confirming the trees you have planted and the projects you have supported.
CommuniTree, Nicaragua
Inspirational project that has planted over 10 million tree with thousands of people. Scaled up in recent years to now be the biggest reforestation project in the country, and has recently been selected by both Springer Nature and Microsoft to deliver carbon balancing.
Hadza Hunter Gatherers & Datooga, Tanzania
Winner of the UN Equator Award for Sustainable Development. Protecting forests in the Yaeda Valley, and area the size of Dartmoor, home to a tribe living there for thousands of years, the ‘last of the first’. The Hadza & Datooga are being given full agency to arrest the causes of deforestation and protect biodiversity and their own way of life.
Khasi Hill, Meghalaya, India
Villagers in the 11 Khasi indigenous kingdoms working cooperatively to protect and restore forests and sacred groves. The first of its kind project in India, reversing deforestation by planting indigenous trees and enabling the forest to naturally regenerate.