Envision Blockchain Solutions build applications that unlock the value of distributed ledger technology. Having operated in the climate solutions space since 2018, they understand the nuances of sustainability markets through deep ecosystem partnerships to create tailored and relevant solutions.
Mission
Transform existing climate accounting systems using open distributed-ledger technology (DLT) to amplify the impact, reach and efficiency of climate initiatives. Envision’s goal is to create a ripple effect that benefits not just individual organizations but the entire sustainability ecosystem and ultimately the planet.
Carbon Project Integrity
The Guardian Ecosystem enables ALLCOT to create a standardized project development framework that fosters trust, transparency and compatibility across all project stakeholders. This ensures the creation of high-integrity projects while maximizing benefits for local communities.
The Guardian Ecosystem facilitates the fulfillment of methodology standards, validation body requirements, project developer needs, and community expectations, thereby enhancing the overall efficiency and transparency of the project
ALLCOT stakeholders benefit from access to accurate and comprehensive information on Hedera Guardian’s public ledger, leveraging a common set of rules and standards, fostering trust and accountability.
Transparently demonstrating how project resources are allocated on the public ledger enables ALLCOT’s stakeholders to comprehend the full scope of a project's efforts, flow of funds, and impact.
By recording the transaction cost at every stage of a project's progress, resulting carbon credits can be priced to maximize revenue distribution back to the local community.
By utilizing Hedera Guardian’s digital ledger, ALLCOT is able to minimize accounting errors, make auditing more open and efficient, and enable a more equitable emergence of verification and validation partners.
The Hedera Guardian Ecosystem establishes a secure chain of data custody, particularly in the case of drone-captured information for origination purposes. This enables ALLCOT to ensure that all project data remains intact, trustworthy and accurately tethered to each project attribute.
By ensuring that data provided aligns with the necessary frameworks, the Guardian helps meet specific industry needs and standards, while ensuring compliance with multiple reporting requirements.
ALLCOT is focused on creating products that surpass the limitations of conventional methods, shifting towards more advanced and efficient approaches to future sustainability markets.
The Guardian serves as a single source of truth, ensuring that policies and rules are standardized and compatible with other sustainability market actors. This enables ALLCOT to align financing through carbon forwards and the structuring of green bonds seamlessly across various entities within the ecosystem
The adoption of a common taxonomy within Guardian enables ALLCOT to establish a standardized language for discussing and addressing various sustainability issues. This fosters better communication and alignment for more effective and cohesive climate action.
By leveraging the flexibility and adaptability of Guardian, ALLCOT has the ability to provide various pathways for different stakeholders as the sustainability market evolves.
The Hedera Guardian Ecosystem operates as a common good, providing services to the entire ecosystem without an extractive fee-based model.
ALLCOT leverages the Hedera Guardian Ecosystem to build on and integrate various services and initiatives already established by other community members. This creates an aligned, streamlined ecosystem of sustainability market actors that avoids duplication to serve the needs of communities, investors, and project developers.
Hedera Guardian
The Guardian has been in active open-source development since 2020, supported by multiple organizations, with Envision Blockchain as the primary maintainer and contributor to the codebase in collaboration with the HBAR Foundation and Swirlds Labs.
The Guardian, an open-source digital public good funded via grants from Hedera and the HBAR Foundation, is built on the Hedera public network and streamlines climate data following digitized methodologies, increasing the transparency, efficiency, and integrity of sustainability assets.
Managed Guardian Service
The open-source Guardian, launched in 2021, had already established itself as a robust platform, enabling transparent, auditable, and traceable documentation of the emission process and lifecycle of digital environmental tokens. Envision Blockchain, leveraging its experience as the maintainer and builder of the open-source Guardian, embarked on a journey to develop a hosted offering tailored to the carbon market industry's needs. In 2022, the Managed Guardian Service (MGS) was officially launched, marking a significant milestone in the Guardian’s maturity. MGS was introduced as a Software as a Service (SaaS) solution, designed to lower technical barriers for application developers and climate project developers. It aimed to provide the same core components of the open-source Guardian, such as the Policy Workflow Engine (PWE) and W3C libraries, while adding the convenience and scalability of a SaaS model.
As MGS continues to evolve, Envision Blockchain remains dedicated to its mission of enabling organizations to create their own discoverable minted tokens on the Hedera public distributed ledger, contributing significantly to making a better planet for everyone.
Public Financial Transparency in Carbon Markets
The Guardian on Hedera facilitates new standards for transparency, accountability, and financial equity in the carbon market. Through this policy workflow engine, the Guardian makes it possible for the first time to more easily ensure equitable income distribution to participating communities. By linking methodologies to actors fulfilling roles within the methodologies, users of the Guardian have the opportunity to ensure that every credit is backed by verifiable data emanating from Hedera accounts and correlated DIDs issuing attestations (through verifiable credentials). Through understanding the flow of finance into the same accounts that attest to data users can better understand the relationship between who gets paid and who is attesting to verifiable information.
This allows organizations to demonstrate their commitment to not just credible climate assets, but assets that support local communities and enables the possibility to understand, in the carbon market, who benefits?
Increased project integrity
Trustworthy financial flows
In a market where trust is paramount, the Guardian provides an auditable data trail from issuance to retirement, ensuring every asset's authenticity and that funds allocated for sustainability projects can be traced back to their source.
Rich, high-resolution data
By streamlining the measurement, reporting, and verification processes, digital MRV ensures that environmental assets on the Guardian are updated with timely, reliable, and auditable data. This enables quick and transparent validation and verification.
Community empowerment
By fostering a community-driven approach, the Guardian ensures that project developers and local communities are actively engaged and benefit from sustainability initiatives, especially in historically exploited regions.
Seamless user interface
Automated, scalable processes
The Guardian platform streamlines the process of developing, verifying, trading, and reporting environmental assets through automated processes. This saves time and reduces potential errors associated with manual interventions.
Fully customizable
The Guardian’s core "Policy Workflow Engine" can be tailored to meet specific requirements, ensuring flexibility and full adaptability to current and future sustainability projects.
Unlocking Collaboration and Scalability
Integration with Standard Registries
The Guardian enables seamless integration with multiple standard registries to ensure that environmental assets are recognized, validated and can be traded in broader markets.
Unified standards
The Guardian provides a standardized approach to managing sustainability assets across multiple industries and standards, simplifying regulatory and compliance checks to bolster industry confidence.
Building a collaborative, open-source ecosystem
By being part of an open-source initiative, Guardian customers benefit from continuous improvements and innovation, as projects continue to build applications to enhance the digital assets.
UNFCCC case study
At COP28, the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference, Envision Blockchain, in collaboration with partners HBAR Foundation and Swirlds Labs, unveiled a suite of innovative enhancements to the open-source Guardian and Managed Guardian Service (MGS) platform, the world’s leading platforms for digitized and digital measurement, reporting, and verification (dMRV) for carbon markets. These advancements, developed with the collaborative input of the UN Climate Change Global Innovation Hub, signal an approach for digital transformation in carbon markets.
This case study highlights the digital transformation of the UNFCCC CDM Methodology Library using the Guardian platform. The transformation streamlines MRV activities and fosters collaboration and innovation in the carbon market, demonstrating the shift towards a digital-first approach in environmental asset management.
As we pivot towards a practical illustration of the transformative impact of the Guardian platform,this case study epitomizes the paradigm shift in environmental policy management – the digital transformation of the UNFCCC CDM (Clean Development Mechanism) Methodology Library via the Guardian platform.
The UNFCCC CDM has been a cornerstone in global efforts to combat climate change, enabling the standards for carbon offset projects to evolve from a common foundation. However, the challenge has always been the complexity inherent in these methodologies and the manual, often cumbersome processes involved in MRV (Measurement, Reporting, and Verification) activities for project developers. The Guardian platform aims to act as a bridge in this context, transitioning from the traditional, paper-bound complexities to a streamlined, digital-first approach.
The digital transformation of the UNFCCC CDM Methodology Library on the Managed Guardian Service (MGS) is a profound leap forward. With MGS, all transactions related to the CDM methodologies are recorded on the Hedera ledger, ensuring a level of transparency and trust previously unattainable. This digital record not only guarantees the integrity of each transaction but also provides a transparent audit trail, accessible to all stakeholders. The result is a system that not only meets but exceeds the current needs of the market, setting a new standard in environmental asset management.
Moreover, the 'Policy Workflow Engine' of MGS offers customizable and automated workflows tailored specifically for the verification needs of the UNFCCC CDM library. This feature allows for an unprecedented level of efficiency in processing CDM methodologies, dramatically reducing the time from data submission to the issuance of environmental assets. By automating and streamlining these processes, MGS addresses the critical bottleneck of high verification costs and the backlog of projects awaiting approval, thus accelerating the market's growth and innovation potential.
Additionally, the user-centric design of the platform is a key element in this transformation. It provides an intuitive and seamless experience for all stakeholders involved, making navigation and utilization straightforward and efficient. This ease of use is critical in encouraging widespread adoption and utilization of the platform, especially among stakeholders who may not have in-depth technical knowledge.
In conclusion, the digital transformation of the UNFCCC CDM Methodology Library on MGS is not just about technological advancement; it's about creating an ecosystem that fosters collaboration, innovation, and efficiency. It’s a model that demonstrates how digital solutions can be effectively employed to transform complex environmental processes, making them more accessible, reliable, and scalable. This case study stands as a testament to the potential of digital solutions in reshaping the landscape of the carbon market and contributing significantly to global climate change mitigation efforts."
Watch the full video on "Innovations in Climate Finance, MRV, & Data Management through web3 Tooling" here.
Envision Blockchain is proud to work with Guardian's ecosystem of partners:
