Climes, founded by Anirudh Gupta and Siddhanth Jayaram, is a climate tech business that collaborates with companies such as Zingbus, MakeMyTrip, and others to assist individuals offset their carbon footprint using a novel methodology.
Every time you leave your house, whether you’re going to the office or to the grocery shop, you leave a carbon imprint.
But what if you could figure out how much this is and pay for it in a way that indirectly increases forest cover?
The firm, founded by Anirudh Gupta and Siddhanth Jayaram in November 2021, collaborates with companies such as Zingbus, MakeMyTrip, Smartivity, Tamarind Chutney, and others. When a consumer uses one of these sites, they are given the option to “neutralise” their experience by paying a modest fee in exchange for ‘climes’. According to Anirudh Gupta, one ‘clime’ equals one kilogramme of carbon offset.
Customers have already neutralised 13 lakh kg of carbon with Climes, he said. Around 80,000 people have purchased these ‘climes’ through their different channels.
Growing up on Air Force stations around the country, Anirudh, 30, had a strong interest in aeroplanes and aerospace. He worked at Airbus until 2020 after graduating from the University of California, Berkeley.
As the globe entered a new decade, he began to see the significance of sustainability.
Anirudh began by establishing The Sustainability Mafia, a non-profit organisation that serves as a network for organisations engaged in this field.
Siddhanth, 29, returned to Bengaluru in 2015 after completing a degree in industrial engineering at Purdue University. He founded and sold a finance firm to KredX. Following that, he worked as a venture capitalist’s investment specialist.
His research on carbon financing led him to the Terra.do climate change programme.
They began their pilot with the support of a $4000 Terra.do grant.
The company’s titular instrument, the ‘clime,’ was the first item the founders did.
Similarly, if you purchase a bus ticket, plane ticket, or t-shirt from a Climes partner, you may offset your ride/emission by paying for it. It costs Rs 2/kg of carbon neutralised.
Assume you purchased five climes for your bus travel. You go to the company’s website after purchasing it. You may view the initiatives to which you can give your ‘climes,’ such as a ‘Farmers for Forests’ project in Ahmednagar, Maharashtra. This effort is “making biodiverse forests financially possible for farmers, “as per the website. The non-profit will receive money if you contribute your ‘climes’ to the initiative.
In a nutshell, you have offset your carbon footprint by giving to a programme that promotes forest cover and assists farmers. Your bus journey contributed to the expansion of forest cover in Ahmednagar.
They use UN-certified models to determine the quantity of carbon emissions.
In December 2021, they secured financing from angel investors Sequoia Capital India, Kalaari, Rainmatter, Stanford Angels & Entrepreneurs India, and Avaana Capital.
Climes now works with 15 brands. Anirudh claims that one of his products, Zingbus, has managed to offset 5 lakh kg of carbon emissions. Customers, according to the owners, are prepared to pay for it, since more than 60% of Zingbus passengers have regularly chosen to neutralise their journeys since May 2022.
Climes is also working on carbon neutral events as another way to offset carbon emissions.
They intend to collaborate with additional clients soon and provide the opportunity to “kickstart your climate action journey” to more individuals.
While more people are aware of the climate catastrophe, not everyone understands the urgency, according to Siddhanth.
