Corporate Climate Solutions

Tradewater

This recommendation was last substantially updated in January 2022 and lightly updated in January 2023 to reflect pricing changes. It may no longer be accurate, both with respect to the evidence it presents and our assessment of the evidence. We do not have plans to update this recommendation in the foreseeable future as we have paused our work assessing direct carbon removal and offset projects. Questions and comments are welcome.

Giving Green believes that donating to our top recommendations is likely to be the most impactful giving strategy for supporting climate action. However, we recognize that contributing to policy advocacy (as most of these recommendations do) may not be tenable for all donors, especially businesses. Taking this into consideration, we recommend Mash Makes specifically for businesses given its more direct alignment with corporate net-zero ambitions. We believe Tradewater to be a high-impact option, but we are unsure of the extent to which its cost-effectiveness approaches that of our top recommendations.

As detailed in our research on refrigerant destruction offsets, we assess the causality of the offsets by verifying the following:

Converting the ODS into less harmful substances;
Establishing the counterfactual of ODS release into the atmosphere;
Ensuring that destruction of ODS does not lead to more production of harmful gases;
Accounting for the carbon footprint of the removal activities.

Conversion of ODS into less harmful substances

Tradewater removes GHGs by incinerating ODS, converting them into substances with lower warming potential.

Establishing the counterfactual of ODS release into the atmosphere

Would ODS gases have escaped in the absence of Tradewater’s project, or would they instead have been sequestered indefinitely in canisters and appliances? The Verra protocol allows projects to claim 100% of destruction when ODS are recovered from appliances at their end-of-life—meaning that Verra assumes 100% of ODS would have leaked if not destroyed—and 25% per year when they are recovered from canisters that could be sold into the market or sit unused in a warehouse. These rates are based on the Article 5 ODS Project Protocol, published by the Climate Action Reserve, a North American offset registry. Overall, the actual leak rate is a major source of uncertainty, as potentially gases in stockpiles could remain sequestered for a long time. However, we think that the overall concept that the gases would eventually leak into the atmosphere is valid. In the Dominican Republic, the majority of ODS that Tradewater destroys are from stockpiles, meaning that the 10-year cumulative emissions would total approximately 94% of the stock-piled ODS under an assumed 25% yearly leak rate.

There are no regulations in the Dominican Republic mandating that ODS be destroyed.⁴ Therefore it is assumed that the gases would not be destroyed without Tradewater’s involvement. Tradewater considers what would have occurred in the counterfactual scenario when quantifying the CO₂e impact of their destruction events.

Ensuring that destruction of ODS does not lead to more production of harmful gases

Destruction of ODS may increase demand for the production of similar gases with high warming potential. According to Tradewater, this is not an issue with its projects because the captured cases of ODS have no further economic use. The appliances that use this type of gas are no longer in service, which is why the ODS is in stockpiles as opposed to being sold in the market.

Accounting for the carbon footprint of the removal activities

As part of its offset certification process, Tradewater accounts for the carbon footprint of obtaining and transporting the ODS. Tradewater uses a default factor of 7.5 tons of CO₂e as determined by the Climate Action Reserve; we have used this factor as well in our project analysis in cell D36.⁵

Overall, we feel confident that Tradewater’s activities are reducing the intensity of GHGs in the atmosphere.

‍

⁴ "In summary, current regulations in the Dominican Republic do not mandate the destruction of ODS material in the country, as other options for the management of ODS are suggested and allowed besides just final disposal." https://registry.verra.org/app/projectDetail/VCS/2449

⁵ “The emission factor shall be equal to 7.5 pounds CO₂e per pound of ODS refrigerant destroyed. This emission factor aggregates both transportation and destruction emissions.” https://www.climateactionreserve.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Article_5_ODS_Protocol_V2.0_Draft_for_Public_Comment.pdf

Tradewater

Overview of Tradewater

Mechanism

Causality

Project-Level Additionality

Marginal Additionality

Permanence

Co-Benefits

Cost

Conclusion

Explore More Climate Giving Research

Support Our Work

Giving Green Fund

Top Climate Nonprofits

Support Our Work