ABOUT THE CARBON ZERO PROJECT
The Carbon Zero Project relies on a lightweight model which develops concepts, finds partner organizations to bring those concepts to life, and helps funders interested in contributing to those projects define high-impact resourcing approaches. We choose not to create significant overhead and instead play a matching role, ensuring that high quality concepts with high potential for decarbonization impact are well-defined, well-resourced, and have clear action plans.
PHILOSOPHY
We believe that great ideas can have incredible impact. We are agnostic to the levers which have the highest potential for impact on decarbonization and believe that efforts in finance, politics, policy, activism, and technology will all be needed. We believe that ultimately only government action can make emissions scarce and drive them down in every sector and geography, so the bulk of our efforts focus on increasing the likelihood & speed of political will to address emissions limits as well as tooling up to make the most of that political will when it is present. Most of our projects are centered in the US & Europe, but we always keep an eye on pathways for international expansion.
ABOUT LIMITS
Limits are often seen as a dirty word. They should not be.
Ultimately emissions limits will be needed to drive emissions down at a local, national, regional, or global level. They will need to be imposed, monitored, and enforced. While they will have costs, emissions limits have the potential to unlock unprecedented growth and opportunity. While markets will orient the economy towards efficiently dealing with limits, markets cannot and will not create limits by themselves - only governments can create limits.
Limits must be efficient, effective, and equitable. Given the state of play, we must prioritize the effectiveness of limits - too much time has been lost on designing efficient mechanisms.
