London-based CUR8, a startup dedicated to building the global market for carbon removals, announced on Tuesday, that it has secured £5.3M (approximately €6.11M) in a pre-seed round of funding.
CUR8 says that the additional funding will help expand its team, product development will continue, and the platform’s ability to service more clients and suppliers will be increased.
Investors in this round
The investment was led by GV (Google Ventures). GV promotes “innovative” entrepreneurs who advance the world. It backs startups in sectors including medical sciences, consumer, business, cryptocurrency, environmental, and emerging technology.
Google Ventures was launched in 2009 and has over $8B in AUM. To date, it has backed 400 companies across North America and Europe.
Besides GV, CapitalT also participated in this round. It is a (pre)seed fund that backs climate technology and the future of work. The fund uses a scientific technique to assess data-driven teams. Test Gorilla, Vaayu, Sojo, and Overstory are a few of its investments.
“Trusted carbon removals from the world’s leading experts”
As part of net zero pledges, global sectors are under pressure to decarbonise operations by 2050, with carbon removals serving as a crucial method of offsetting unavoidable emissions.
This is where CUR8 looks to make a difference.
CUR8 claims to create the necessary technologies to accelerate the carbon removals sector. The platform purchases carbon offset credits from reputable sellers and creates reputable carbon offset portfolios by combining various tactics and techniques.
The startup aims to lower the cost over time as the sector grows and develops, starting with an industry-standard set price of £150 (nearly €173.31) per carbon removal, to make it more affordable for businesses of all kinds.
It aims to facilitate 1 billion tonnes of carbon reductions annually by 2050 by balancing risk and impact.
In the past, CUR8’s platform has removed carbon from royal events like The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Pageant and The State Funeral of HM Queen Elizabeth II as well as public events like British Summer Time and All Points East.
The platform’s portfolio includes removals like direct air capture (1pointfive), enhanced rock weathering (UNDO), and durable soil carbon (Loam Bio).
CUR8 was founded in 2022 by Marta Krupinska (co-founder of Azimo, Google for Startups UK lead), Dr Gabrielle Walker (carbon removals expert and founder of non-profit Rethinking Removals) and Mark Stevenson (author and former advisor to UK Ministry of Defense).
Dr Walker says, “I’ve been working in climate science for 30 years and it can be easy to feel overwhelmed and pessimistic about the 2050 net-zero deadlines. Carbon removal, along with decarbonisation at scale, has the potential to help us reach these goals, but only if we have the right tools to scale this market to 10 billion tonnes a year by 2050.”
10 per cent of carbon removals by 2050
According to the IPCC, the world must eliminate 10 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide by 2050. CUR8’s goal is to enable 10 per cent of all global carbon removals over the next 25+ years by developing essential industry infrastructure.
To reduce risk and help businesses understand the quality of their carbon expenditures, CUR8 does all supplier due diligence internally, recording more than 100 data points on effect, integrity, and scalability
The development of carbon sequestration is also tracked and monitored by the startup’s platform so that purchasers can invest in contracts that last for a number of years and use it to guide their ESG (environmental, social, and governance) and net zero plans.
CUR8 will provide financial mechanisms to support the carbon removal business in the future, enabling the scalability of new technologies and ensuring that the sector can play a key part in addressing the climate catastrophe.
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