Ctrl2Go Group recently introduced Russia's first carbon polygon, or carbon farm. What is this? Why does Russia need carbon farming?

This project is a harbinger, the forerunner of the industry, about which experts say it will be the keystone in the XXI century. We are talking about carbon absorption (sequestration). It is estimated that by 2035, the turnover of the carbon sequestration industry will be several times larger than that of the entire oil and gas industry. Ctrl2Go has attempted to act as a visionary and started its first project in Russia. What is more important is that this is the first real pilot program, the main intent of which is to understand how to calculate CO₂ absorption and to estimate the effectiveness of the new carbon sequestration industry. The world is experiencing a global green transformation of the economy. Now each service will have another important parameter, in addition to price – environmental performance. In a short time, perhaps in two or three years, any power engineer, oil-industry worker, chemist, or metallurgist will be obliged to look for where they can buy the so-called carbon credit, which will allow companies to operate on hydrocarbon or coal fuel. We at Ctrl2Go have just started a program that will just give out these carbon credits. Our carbon farms will absorb carbon. The amount of carbon will be counted, monetized, put into carbon registries and eventually bought by those who have exhausted their quotas.

How is carbon absorbed? By green plants, forests, agricultural fields. Through the use of modern agricultural technologies and by improving photosynthesis, it is possible to increase twofold or even threefold the energy of carbon dioxide absorption from the atmosphere. But in the first place it is necessary to measure CO₂ absorption and "breathing". What does "breathing" mean? Part of CO2 transferred into the soil and some part of it is released from the soil. This is called carbon balance or sequestration. Until recently, sequestration calculations were based on a rather rough unreliable estimation model. In addition, every country, every sector of the economy has its own models, and they are not necessarily the same.

Our technology could apparently change the entire landscape of the green industry. At Ctrl2Go, we have mastered how to directly measure the amount of absorbed carbon using AI technology, machine learning, Big Data analytics, special probes and space orbiting sensors, UAVs, and by measurements on the Earth's surface. Such a thorough data collection makes it possible to understand practically online how much carbon is absorbed by this or that area, this or that site, and how much it emits or, in other words, releases greenhouse gases

The methods for calculating carbon emissions are already in place. There are several of them, and not only in our country, but also in Europe and the United States. Why is the Ctrl2Go technology, our Russian technology, considered as the most interesting, the most adequate, and what is the possibility that it will be recognized by all the essential market participants for tomorrow?

This is a key question. The emission and sequestration calculations directly impact so-called cross-border carbon taxes. In a year, Europe will impose a tax on any (non-environmental – ed. note) products from the countries outside Europe. If this happens, our exporters will have to pay the carbon tax $8 to $30 bln annually. In this context, it is necessary to have our own system of measurements and calculations, so that they do not count our emissions in their own way in the face of tough economic competition. Trillions of dollars are at stake.

However, it would not be a viable way to make our measurement and counting technology the best one, the coolest, it does not seem to be a good fit. It should be more or less the same as that of all global market participants, based on the same principles, on the same algorithms, on the same hardware. So, the certification problems of our Russian product will have a better chance of being resolved. Because anyone who tries to cast doubt on our technology also will doubt similar solutions in the United States, Canada, New Zealand and Europe. For this reason, our technology is very identical to similar products from other countries. But we believe that our technology nonetheless will be better.

So the question is – how can we protect ourselves, how can we safeguard ourselves against incorrect calculations?

Actually, this is the decisive issue that was reflected about a year ago in a decree of our government. The main task of environmental monitoring is to protect against unfair competition. The global community says that protecting the climate, fighting global warming, avoiding the apocalypse and saving the world from Armageddon are all right and great ideas. At the same time, the environmental transformation is the main driver for our Western partners in terms of competition.

They seek to impose significant and regular costs that all countries and economies should bear in order to meet certain environmental standards. Such expenditures will inevitably increase the cost of production, reducing its competitiveness. In this regard, having your own system of calculating the carbon balance, sequestration and emissions is the imperative of the time. Those countries that do not have such systems will forever remain the clients. The countries who employ such systems will be equal players in the giant and financially monstrous carbon market.

In general, is this a certain set of technologies, mostly agricultural ones, that allow the absorption of greenhouse gases?

First of all, the forest technology. The agricultural technology for absorption is in the distant future. In the meantime, all hope lies with forests. China. China has 11 billion tonnes of CO₂ they emit into the atmosphere every year. Recently, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced that China will become a carbon-neutral country by 2060. This means equality between emitted and absorbed carbon. Let's say if they emit half as much, they will have 6 billion tonnes of CO₂ by that time. But they have no forests to sequester such amount of carbon dioxide, they have no free area compared to Russia. 11 million sq. km of forests covering the land area of our country plus abandoned farmland which has also been transformed into the forests actively absorbing carbon dioxide. This is a unique, unprecedented reservoir on the planet capable of CO₂ absorption. In this sense, the 21st century is the century of our country. We will be the most important player in the CO₂ absorption industry. Canada, whose geography is very similar to our country, will be in second place by a significant margin.

But there are also Brazil, the Amazon, Indonesia...

The situation with tropical forests is more challenging. First, they are being cleared at a frightening rate. During our talk, about 10 soccer fields of tropical forest in the world have disappeared in the mentioned Brazil and in Indonesia where now only 3% of the original forest resources has survived. Also, tropical forests certainly absorb CO₂ much more than our northern, boreal forests (taiga). Secondly, any tree that falls in the tropical jungle turns into CO₂ within a day and is released back into the atmosphere. Our forests are a long-term repository of carbon, which has turned into dead, dry wood fallen into swamps or stands as trees.

So the main thing is still the forests. The existing forests or the forests that we are going to plant, for instance?

That's a good question. Right now, huge amounts of money are being invested in new trees. Cyber trees, which grow at a frightening rate, are not afraid of pests or disease, are not affected by typhoons, cyclones, monsoons, and trade winds, and intend to stand for 500 years holding carbon. These are genetically engineered trees, very powerful hybrids. In the future, we can imagine that there will be up to 500 million hectares of cyborg tree plantations on the planet, whose only mission is to absorb CO₂. In our country, where legislation is not very supportive for genetically engineered plants, we rely mostly on young forests that have grown in 30 years on the lands taken out of agricultural use.

We intend and are quite ready to test new technology using high-yield trees rather than genetically engineered products. For example, there is a paulownia tree, it grows 4-5 meters each year. After 7 years, its trunk has a diameter of 40 cm. It's quite a tree felling plantation, which gives harvestable timber. We have already planned to plant 2 hectares of paulownia on our carbonic farm. We got area-specific seedlings that are not afraid of our frosts, or, as it seems to us, not afraid. Time will tell. We also intend to see how we can grow a super-productive artificial afforestation, a piece of the planet lungs. This is a very interesting area of work.

To be honest, I've never heard of cyber trees. It sounds threatening. What is the core idea of the technology? Won't these trees "eat up" all the other things afterwards? What are living inhabitants around them?

That's right, we all react cautiously to the words "genetic," "engineering," "cyborgs," and "genetic modifications." There's nothing we can do about it. Half the food we have on the table is some sort of cyborgs. Corn, soybeans, tomatoes, and many other crops were long ago and significantly altered by genetic engineers. These are not necessarily genetically modified plants: being re-engineered by geneticists does not necessarily mean that a major modification has taken place.

Forests that absorb carbon dioxide are supposed to stand for 300...400...500 years. They need special strong roots that can withstand any hurricane. Hurricanes are inevitable in the era of global warming. There are genes that enable plants at the very beginning to extend their roots to a depth of 50-70 m, and no cyclone can damage them.

The wood structure is similar to that of concrete. It has cellulose, hemicellulose, stucco, and all together it turns out to be a kind of concrete with reinforcement. So, by playing with the genes that regulate these substances, you can create superhard wood. For example, there is a new poplar tree that grows faster than an ordinary poplar tree. Its wood substance is 2-fold stronger than that of an ordinary poplar, because the new poplar has the structure of this "living" concrete.

These trees should not get sick. There are special genes that protect the tree, repel pests – bark beetles and other eaters of fresh wood.

It is also important that the trees do not get on fire quickly. A fire in the forest with burning trees of 2 meters in diameter is an all-planet phenomenon. There is a special genetic design that makes trees almost fireproof (fire-resistant). They will not burn at normal temperatures.

What we really see is a kind of a certain construct, a certain mechanism, which can be called a "cyber tree". There is nothing to be afraid of: these trees will not attack people. They definitely will not replace conventional trees in existing ecosystems. This is because, first, they are infertile. Second, in conventional ecosystems, "combative" plants and trees will not surrender their land so easily.

That sounds like science fiction. Now let's go back to carbon farms. What are they, after all, and what is going on there? What exactly are drones and satellites to do with it?

If you decide to provide a service to absorb carbon, to count carbon, and get paid for it, you need a place to grow trees. If you have such a place, it means that you have a site for a carbon farm.

Trees on the site can vary in species and age. Soils can also be heterogeneous, changes can also occur in the hydrological regime of water bodies. Therefore, the first thing that is done on a carbon farm is a thorough assessment (determining the number of tree stands, timber volume, amount of trees, etc., as well as the trees recruitment. – ed. note), in other words, taking an inventory. On the basis of the data obtained, the standard area of the forest is selected. The scientists, our German partners from the University of Göttingen, measure literally every tree, every bush in the area, take soil samples, examine the fall of needles and leaves, in this way they determine the turnover of carbon on the Earth.

At the same time, we receive satellite imagery, while drones with special hyperspectral cameras fly over the forest and take spectral profiles. The information obtained from these three sources (space imagery, airborne surveys, and ground measurements) is processed by a large computer program that searches for correlations between them. In addition to surveys and measurement counts, the point is to get away from labor-consuming and time-consuming on-ground surveys as quickly as possible. Satellites and drones and artificial intelligence should replace the hard work on the ground. At our carbon farm, these technologies are being fine-tuned right now.

The economics of the sequestration business is built using a simple formula: if you absorb 5 tonnes of CO₂ per hectare – you get $200 from this hectare. If you have a million hectares, you can make profit of $200 million. Let me remind you that Russia has millions of square kilometers of forest lands, which means that profit for our country could reach tens of billions of US dollars, or even hundreds of billions.

As a matter of fact, Ctrl2Go has developed a technology that allows scientists to make their research work in a more efficient way and also to build predictive mathematical models. The technology will make it possible to measure, to calculate the level of carbon sequestration where it is physically inconvenient to do so. Is this true?

That's exactly right. We use images of our carbon farm area taken over many years and archive them. We add meteorological and/or agrochemical data to the archive. Formerly, agrochemists work on the farm land, so we have this opportunity to obtain such data. We also check the chemical composition of the soil. In general, we get a huge amount of data, which are analyzed by a special program that includes machine learning.

Ten years ago, no one could do anything with these terabytes of information. And now working with big data is a common thing, and all of the world has learned how to do it. Only 10% of the technology we are currently practicing on carbon farms deals with trees, soil, access roads, and surveillance towers, whereas 90% of the technology is artificial intelligence.

Machine learning is pivotal point. While processing and analyzing the data, the machine tries to understand where the situation is developing, how much sequestration will occur in the current season and in the next season, and whether there are fire-prone areas. Spectral observations can identify tree felling areas. Then we know that in a certain place using certain coordinates we need to carry out the fire prevention work, otherwise there is a risk of fire. What is a fire? It means that all our work has been for nothing. We are absorbing CO2, and all we have absorbed quickly flew back into the atmosphere with the fire and smoke.

The carbon farm in the Kaluga region is an experimental landfill. How will the project scale up?

We intend to sell our instructions on how to set up carbon farms. It is quite a sophisticated business, given the ecomonitoring and emission-calculation technology. We expect that very soon we will have customers who will say, "I am a metallurgist/coal miner/oil producer. The state/international agencies allocated me the following quotas: sectoral, industry-specific quotas, or even national quotas. But in order to get a permit to burn extra fuel, I need a carbon credit, I need a farm."

With our experimental farm, we will be pioneers of a new industry and will be able to replicate carbon polygons on a national scale. The Ctrl2Go's solutions were very highly rated by the scientific community, the government, and the presidential administration.

The business of carbon farms is now actively developing in most countries. There is a frustrating fact: if you now type in a Russian search engine the phrase "carbon farm", this will result in a maximum of 2–3 mentions of our project, while the query "carbon farming" – about 300 million search results. The difference is tangible. I hope that in the future the of Ctrl2Go solutions will help to reduce this gap in awareness and understanding of the carbon footprint in Russia.

Who are the key players in the market of carbon farmers and buyers of the technology now?

In Russia, only Ctrl2Go. And it will probably be only Ctrl2Go for a long time to come. A carbon farm is a serious challenge, it's not just a land area, not just a forest, it's a very large pool of competencies, technology, and experience. Experience is the most essential thing. It is the untrodden trail. It's easy to misstep. As for potential buyers of carbon farms or loans, we already have a huge waiting list. We have just said that we are making a carbon farm and it's already working, and then very big players from various industries start calling and saying, "We want carbon farms, too." This is a marker that we have hit a sore spot in our economy. But I should emphasize again: we're talking about ourselves in superlatives, we are good, we are visionaries, and are able to do the right thing, that's great. However, this is a worldwide trend. In China alone, about 25 million carbon credits are sold, and its network of carbon farms is measured in thousands. But Russia is on the way to catch up.

Ctrl2Go has made technology that makes it possible to process large data streams and build research algorithms. On the other hand, do we have enough people who will handle the collected information and further develop the issue of carbon sequestration in terms of environmental protection and nature management?

I have to say that Ctrl2Go has done most of the research work. We have fine-tuned the underlying technology. Now it needs to be adapted to other latitudes, climatic conditions, soil types, and forest types. No research activity is planned in this process. We will need support of the scientific community. Although, we do not have a staffing bottleneck. First of all, at the very beginning Ctrl2Go engaged leading experts, global specialists from many specialized research institutes and universities, including not only our professionals. Now the circle of our scientific partners has expanded even further. For example, Minister of Science and Higher Education Valery Falkov says that we need 80 such carbon polygons, and suggests that we should organize farms in cooperation with leading universities, as North America currently is doing. In this regard, I can say that the scientific potential is even excessive. There are enough programmers, mathematicians in our country, specifically in Ctrl2Go. The key point of the technology is F5 platforms that already work in Ctrl2Go, though for a different project (for railway transport). The platform turns out to be versatile, it works with ultra-large data streams and has proven to be more than effective in the field of ecology.

So, if there's a method for counting the absorbed carbon, then there would probably be a method for counting the released carbon. Does your system work both ways, or do you only count what is absorbed?

Yes, emitted carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases of methane, nitrogen oxides, fluoride compounds – that is on everyone's lips right now. The Americans claim that they can determine from space the amount of greenhouse gases released by a single sailing vessel. There is a system to monitor the entire planet, called Carma. The satellites estimate the emissions from each of the 50,000 large power generating companies on Earth. The Europeans are deploying several thousand Copernicus satellites. Their task is to especially monitor CO₂ emissions. Humanity is mobilizing against uncontrolled atmospheric pollution.

Therefore, emission monitoring is an extremely important task. Let me remind you: estimation of emissions has an impact on carbon border taxes, national quotas. That is why we pay special attention to the direct measurement of emissions. We know how to do this for a while, and we are now opening a new project on this subject.

A carbon farm is a part of implementation of the carbon polygon, where we are going to practice our technology of direct measurements of emissions. So your question is not just an urgent issue, it's super urgent, and we're thinking earnestly about it.

I see. Let's hope that in the next few years, Yandex will know more about the carbon footprint and the farms that absorb it.

The point is that Yandex needs to find this out earliest: IT companies account for 24-25% of all the energy that is wasted on Earth. That's twice as much as transport all together. And that proportion will grow very fast. Up to 40% of all energy by 2050 will be spent by IT companies. That's why Microsoft and Google have declared themselves carbon-neutral. How do they manage this? By keeping the carbon farm industry moving forward. The main leaders of the carbon farm business in the world are Microsoft and Google. Yandex should think about that, too. I hope, it will catch on much faster than the number of links in the search engine.

Well, then, it is obviously logical that it is the IT company here that initiates the creation of carbon farms in Russia.

Yes.

We talked about taking samples of air, soil, and forests. Is water part of this process in any way?

In this particular case, no. However, Ctrl2Go has a signed agreement with the Indian government (Ministry of Environment and Water Resources) on remote control of water quality. We will monitor rivers in central India and offshore areas around the Indian Peninsula, where the Indians plan to set up fish farms.

In our carbon project, we have the theme of carbon sequestration in swamps. That is where there is enough water. In the near future a choice will be made as to whether or not we are separately involved in water ecological monitoring. Or we will implement the water aspects of our technology in swamps.

The situation with swamps is ambiguous. On the one hand, they are rapidly growing. There is almost nothing decomposing in them: sapropel and peat –partially decomposed plant remains – fall to the bottom. It would seem that swamps are huge areas that consume CO₂ from the atmosphere. But on the other hand, swamps produce huge amounts of methane CH4 . This is an even more harmful gas than CO₂, about 30 times

We have three wonderful relic swamps on our pilot farm, each 600,000 years old. Next season we need to figure out: are they sequesterers or emitters after all? Do they help the planet fight global warming or are they a climate evil? It's very interesting to find out.

That sounds romantic. Relict swamps...

First of all, our carbon landfill area is a romantic phenomenon. There are architectural and natural treasures of Russian history: mounds, ancient settlements. This is the place where the standoff on the Ugra river took place, where our country gained its independence (the battle that put an end to the Tatar-Mongol yoke in Russia. – ed. note). A beautiful place, part of the national park. A living Red Book of flora and fauna. Also, our pride is three wonderful swamps that were left after the Scandinavian mitluk half a million years ago. So our carbon farm is an aesthetic landmark. It looks very picturesque.

It's great. This is a wonderful picture. And still about business. What are Russia's chances to succeed in the global carbon business? Who are our allies and why do we think that we can really become more or less serious competitors for those who have already surpassed us?

Yes, today they are ahead of Russia in terms of technology. Their carbon credit market is more advanced. Now the big issue on the agenda is: Where to sequester carbon after all? Show me a place on the Luxembourg map that can absorb a significant amount of carbon dioxide! Russia, after all, has an incredible resource for large-scale CO₂ sequestration. Therefore, our country is simply destined to be a leader in decarbonization. It is, therefore, necessary to monetize such great opportunities: according to various estimates, the entire territory of Russia now absorbs from 350 million to billion tonnes of CO₂ in the overall. We should not forget that in five or seven years a tonne of CO₂ will be worth $70-80. A simple multiplication shows what kind of market we are talking about. On top of all, the carbon farm, specifically our carbon farm, is also a way to increase our sequestration. You can't just sit idle and wait for the trees in the forest to absorb something for you and make you money. It is really possible to increase the efficiency of this sequestration many times. So we are talking about Business No. 1.

Interviewed by Vladimir Zmeyushchenko and Darya Topilskaya.


Source: website First Digital