Microsoft has signed a three-year settlement to purchase almost 37,000 tons of carbon removing credit from Indian startup Alt Carbon, marking the tech large’s first enhanced-rock weathering deal in Asia.
Beneath the settlement, Alt Carbon will ship 36,920 metric tons of carbon dioxide removing credit by 2029 from its Darjeeling Revival Undertaking in jap India. Microsoft additionally has an choice to buy extra volumes if the startup meets supply and verification milestones.
The deal follows studies that suggested Microsoft — the world’s largest purchaser of carbon-removal credit — had paused elements of its carbon-removal procurement program. The corporate rejected those claims, saying it remained dedicated to its local weather objectives even because it refined its sustainability technique.
The settlement is a possible boon for Alt Carbon, a Bengaluru-based startup based in 2023 that’s targeted on carbon removing tasks, together with enhanced rock weathering. This method entails spreading crushed basalt and different silicate rocks on farmland to hurry up pure chemical reactions that assist retailer carbon dioxide. Alt Carbon sources basalt from the Rajmahal Traps in jap India and deploys it throughout farmland in West Bengal, the place the rock reacts with rainwater and atmospheric carbon dioxide to kind steady bicarbonates.
Discussions with Microsoft started in early 2025 and culminated greater than a 12 months later after intensive scientific assessment, due diligence, and contract negotiations, Alt Carbon co-founder and President Sparsh Agarwal advised TechCrunch. Microsoft additionally required extra monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV) measures past registry necessities, together with expanded data-sharing and carbon quantification protocols, he mentioned.
The deal comes as patrons more and more search for confirmed carbon-removal tasks in a market the place verified provide stays scarce. A whole bunch of startups have emerged promising to take away carbon dioxide from the environment. Nonetheless, solely a small fraction have delivered verified credit at industrial scale.
“The issue that exists proper now could be that there are a whole lot of suppliers, however there are only a few verified deliveries on the market,” Agarwal mentioned. “When firms are capable of ship, everybody desires to make sure that they get part of the provision.”
Alt Carbon has issued nearly 10,000 carbon-removal credits by way of enhanced rock weathering so far, making it the world’s largest issuance of such credit, in line with Agarwal. The startup expects to challenge one other 15,000 credit by the top of the 12 months.
Alt Carbon operates two carbon-removal tasks in North Bengal, together with one devoted to Japanese transport large Mitsui OSK Traces and a bigger program from which Microsoft’s credit shall be sourced, Agarwal mentioned. The startup has expanded past tea estates into rice-growing areas and now works with greater than 35,000 farmers throughout about 80,000 acres.
Credit underneath the Microsoft settlement shall be issued by way of Isometric, a carbon-removal registry that developed an enhanced rock-weathering methodology.
The deal additionally displays the rising function of emerging-market suppliers in carbon removing. Builders from the International South now account for about 26% of carbon-removal credit score issuances, up from roughly 2% in 2022, Agarwal mentioned. He added that worldwide patrons had been usually skeptical of Indian carbon tasks when Alt Carbon launched over two years in the past, however rising issuance volumes and stricter verification requirements have helped enhance confidence out there.
The Alt Carbon settlement is just not Microsoft’s first carbon-removal funding in India. In January, the corporate signed an agreement with another Indian startup, Varaha, to buy greater than 100,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide removing credit generated by way of biochar over three years.
Microsoft joins a roster of patrons of Alt Carbon’s credit that features procurement coalitions similar to Frontier, whose members embody Google, Stripe and Shopify, and NextGen, backed by firms together with UBS, Swiss Re, and Boston Consulting Group, in line with registry knowledge.
Agarwal mentioned Alt Carbon plans to develop its deployment footprint roughly fivefold over the subsequent 4 to 5 years from about 80,000 acres at present, as demand for verified carbon-removal credit grows.
Alt Carbon, which final 12 months raised $12 million in a seed funding spherical led by tech investor Lachy Groom, has constructed its personal MRV infrastructure, together with laboratories in Bengaluru and Darjeeling that it makes use of to research soil and water samples and quantify carbon removing. Agarwal mentioned bettering verification capabilities and reducing measurement prices shall be vital to scaling enhanced rock weathering tasks in India and past.
If you buy by way of hyperlinks in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t have an effect on our editorial independence.
