As co-founders and active members of the Crypto Climate Accord and WEF’s Crypto Impact and Sustainability Accelerator (CISA), Ripple is committed to a low-carbon future for the crypto industry and global economy. Ripple regularly works in partnership with respected climate players such as the Rocky Mountain Institute and crypto sustainability advocates like the Alliance for Innovative Regulation—all with a goal to move the crypto industry and affiliated organizations towards 100% renewable energy use and net-zero emissions. In 2020, Ripple announced its plan to go carbon neutral by 2030 and is on track to do so by 2028 or sooner through reduced emissions, clean energy use, and investments in innovative carbon removal projects.
As mitigating climate change increasingly becomes an urgent global priority, so too does global demand for carbon reduction and carbon credits. This is why, in May 2022, Ripple announced a commitment of $100 million to scale and strengthen carbon markets, the largest pledge of its kind in the crypto industry. This funding will accelerate new, high-quality carbon removal activity and help modernize and scale carbon markets through the use of blockchain technology and capital investments in innovative carbon removal companies and climate-focused fintechs.
The existing voluntary carbon market is facing critical challenges that make it unlikely to fulfill its potential in helping to reach global climate goals. Such challenges include slow (and expensive) time to market for producers, a lack of transparency and trust among buyers, and overly centralized control by a few oligopolistic actors. Blockchain technology provides a powerful new pathway toward greatly reducing the potential for fraud and double counting in traditional carbon offset trading markets. Blockchain also has the potential to introduce increased liquidity and scalability to carbon markets while driving fairer (and higher) prices and a greater share of revenue to suppliers—many of whom are located in emerging economies.
A growing number of sustainability projects have chosen to partner with Ripple and leverage the XRPL—citing its proven reliability, industrial strength, and feature-rich functionality built to support various projects and use cases. Innovative carbon tech companies utilizing XPRL include: Thallo, a marketplace for high-quality voluntary carbon credits; Carbon Cure—also a Climate Pledge signatory—whose groundbreaking technologies permanently store captured CO2 in concrete; Xange, a climate-focused fintech developing a carbon credit solution on the XRPL that will issue carbon credits from the African Great Green Wall Initiative; and Carbon Title, the commercial real-estate industry’s decarbonization platform.
In addition, we directly support sustainability projects by providing funds that are critical to scaling their operations and meeting the Paris Accord climate goals.
Like any race, the fight to mitigate climate change and avoid potentially catastrophic effects is not an individual effort. Even the most gifted runners rely on the support and help of teammates, coaches, partners, and race organizers. It will take all of us—nations, nonprofits, innovators and more—working together to cross the finish line ahead of the 1.5 degree Celsius mark by 2050, 2040, or sooner.
By joining The Climate Pledge, we are reinforcing our industry-leading commitment to sustainability and we’re excited to be part of a community of like-minded companies that shares knowledge, ideas, best practices, and an urgent dedication to climate action.
Ripple signed The Climate Pledge on September 1, 2022. For more details on Ripple’s commitment to sustainability visit ripple.com/impact.
