Pune Inc: Prabhat Road is a ‘national asset’, finds startup that created unique app to measure carbon sequestration by trees

The Green Concept is holding up the leafy, tree-lined Prabhat Road as a prototype of a rich carbon sink. The company, co-founded by Aboli Kulkarni and Girish Kulkarni, has been working on the stretch with Aparna Watve, a senior botanist based in Pune. The startup’s founders are experts in applied ecology, carbon assessments, ecosystem restoration with mathematics, machine learning, data analytics and AI.

India, the third largest carbon emitter in the world, announced at the 26th session of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 26) in November 2021 that it was setting a target to achieve net zero by 2070. This means that the country focuses on the amount of carbon emitted by industry and how much of this is being sequestered.

Starting in 2026, businesses in India can engage in carbon trading. This means they can buy or sell carbon credits to help them meet their carbon targets. Companies that have captured more carbon than they have emitted can sell their excess carbon credits to entities that have emitted more than they have captured. India specifically focuses on the petrochemicals, iron and steel, cement, and pulp and paper industries.

Kulkarni said, “There is a certain way of calculating carbon sequestration for vegetation. It is a standardised way set out by the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change, the largest body that comments on climate dynamics. Right now, the process is completely manual in India. If I have to know the carbon sequestered by trees on a national highway all across Maharashtra, no process does an automation with a species-specific accuracy.”

“So, if we take trees in public spaces, from a forest to a street or a park, all of these vegetated zones act as carbon sinks and are owned by the government. There is a need for quick technology to compile all of these individual stories together and record the data to know how much carbon is being absorbed in places like Bhandarkar Road, Camp, or Empress Botanical Garden,” says Shetti.

The Green Concept has launched an app that will take in all the data, which the processing unit will calculate on the server. This way, a city or town planner or any individual who owns a piece of land can see all the relevant ecological and carbon information on the dashboard.

“The app can accurately calculate the carbon sequestration for every tree and bring it to a ‘visualisable’, mappable dashboard,” says Shetti. This is, possibly, the only such technology of its kind in the country.

While Shetti specialises in landscape ecology and ecosystem dynamics, Aboli specialises in vegetation ecology, biodiversity, and carbon assessments, and Girish brings his skills in mathematics, data science, and machine learning. Though the company was set up in March, the group has been working together for close to six years since they were in Germany for higher studies and work.

“Indian carbon market is projected to be $1.2 billion in a couple of years. The Global carbon market is around $650 billion at present and has a CAGR of 39.4 per cent till 2030,” says Girish.

The company’s clients will be industries, any entity that consumes electricity that is generated through fossil fuels.

Shetti adds, “Civic bodies and governments carry out tree censuses every three to five years, but carbon assessment does not happen. This will become important as we approach 2030 when India aims to cut carbon emissions by 50 per cent on its way to carbon neutrality.”