This project reduces the carbon intensity of the energy infrastructure powering Indonesia’s rapid economic development. The Asahan power plant utilizes Indonesia’s abundant hydro resources to provide renewable electricity to the grid. The rural communities that live in the North Sumatra region will benefit from a more reliable electricity supply and new income-generating opportunities.

Over the past half century Indonesia experienced tremendous economic development. The Southeast Asian country ranks as the fourth-fastest growing large economy in the world from 1968 to today. This rapid economic growth coincided with enormous gains in poverty alleviation, with poverty in Indonesia declining from 60% to less than 10% over the same time frame. 

As part of its development, Indonesia brought electricity to nearly all of its citizens. This is a particularly impressive feat considering the country’s millions of inhabitants are spread across 6,000 islands. Even as Indonesia’s power infrastructure expanded, the country has struggled with energy shortages and power outages. The Sumatra grid in particular suffered some of the longest blackouts.

Economic growth and electricity access are critical for sustainable development. But they often come with a problematic side effect for the planet – increased greenhouse gas pollution. Over the past 20 years, Indonesia’s energy sector CO2 emissions more than doubled. Today, power generation is the largest contributor to Indonesia’s emissions from fossil fuel combustion.

With 50,300 miles (81,000 kilometers) of coastline, the Indonesian archipelago is highly vulnerable to rising sea levels and other impacts of climate change. The archipelago straddles the equator, resulting in a tropical climate. Existing challenges like extreme rainfall, landslides, and heat waves will only be exacerbated by global warming. 

Indonesia’s abundant natural resources offer great potential for renewable energy like hydro, geothermal, and solar. Yet most of these resources remain untapped. Nearly all (80%) of Indonesia’s electricity is generated by fossil fuels, with two-thirds coming from highly polluting coal-fired power plants. On the flip-side, only 6% of Indonesia’s hydro resources have been utilized. 

This project supports the operation of a 180 MW hydroelectric power plant on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. The run-of-river power plant uses the natural flow of the Asahan River to produce renewable energy. This powerful river is fed by Lake Toba, the largest lake in Southeast Asia which was formed by a supervolcano eruption 74,000 years ago. 

Each year the Asahan hydropower plant provides around 1.2 million MWh of electricity per year to the Sumatra grid. This added electricity generation capacity supports rural communities in North Sumatra that are prone to power shortages. It also reduces the carbon intensity of the electric grid.

Run-of-river systems like the Asahan plant are a more environmentally sustainable type of hydropower. Instead of building  an artificial reservoir and dam, run-of-the-river systems harvest energy through a penstock that allows the free flow of water from the river. As a result, the power plant’s construction had minimal impacts on the surrounding environment. Run-of-river systems also avoid the methane emissions produced by decomposing organic material that gets trapped behind dams.  

Along with supporting Indonesia’s renewable energy transition, this project creates employment opportunities in rural areas. The project facilitates community upskilling by training local workers to operate and maintain the plant. Over 15,000 jobs were created by the construction of the hydro power plant. When the plant became operational, over 2,500 people were hired, mostly from North Sumatra.  

The project will also implement community development initiatives in local villages. This includes constructing a small dam to supply drinking water and donating equipment to a senior high school.

This project is conserving a biodiverse peat swamp forest in Indonesian Borneo that was slated for conversion to palm oil plantations. Along with protecting this carbon rich ecosystem, the project supports the reintroduction of critically endangered orangutans into their wild habitat. By addressing issues such as poverty, hunger, and disease, the project is tackling the root causes of deforestation while improving the livelihoods of local communities. Due to its holistic approach, Rimba Raya is the first REDD+ project to be validated under the Sustainable Development Verified Impact Standard for contributing to all 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

Indonesia’s rainforests are a biodiversity hotspot and the tropical peat swamps in Borneo are no exception. More than 50 endangered species, including Bornean orangutans, proboscis monkeys, pangolins, hairy-nosed otters, and Borneo Bay cats, can be found in the peat swamps on the island’s southern coast.

Unfortunately, Indonesia’s critical peat swamp ecosystems are rapidly disappearing, primarily to develop palm oil plantations. After years of extensive development, Indonesia is now the world’s largest producer of palm oil. The process of converting the land to a plantation involves logging and burning the trees and subsequently draining the peatland. As this happens, the massive amounts of carbon that are stored in the aboveground biomass and the deep layers of peat is released into the atmosphere. The draining of the peat swamps also leaves them far more vulnerable to fires. Fires set for agricultural purposes often get out of control, causing further devastation to Indonesia’s peatlands. Between 1990 and 2005 Indonesia lost about 2% of its forest cover annually. 

As Indonesia’s peat swamp habitat disappears, so do the animals that depend on it. It is estimated that palm oil development results in the deaths of around 1,000 to 5,000 orangutans every year. Over the last half century, substantial loss and fragmentation of their habitat has led Bornean orangutan populations to decline by 95%. 

Luckily, there are efforts underway to protect Indonesia’s orangutans and other vulnerable species. In Borneo, the world-renowned Tanjung Puting National Park houses one of the largest protected orangutan populations and Orangutan Foundation International leads ongoing orangutan conservation activities.

Wild animals are not the only beings affected by the loss of Indonesia’s peat swamps. Indigenous communities lose access to their land and resources, sometimes without their consent. Once their land has been converted, community members are left with few options but to work on the palm oil plantations where they face degrading conditions and are underpaid. Women often end up helping out on the plantations for little or no pay, and are tasked with more hazardous activities like spraying pesticides without protective gear. The development of palm oil plantations can also cause other harmful impacts for nearby communities, such as flooding, pollution of their water sources, and exposure to smoke from fires. 

This project is protecting over 90,000 acres (36,000 hectares) of primarily peat swamp forest on Borneo’s southern coast between Tanjung Puting National Park and the Seruyan River. This particular area was slated by the government for conversion to palm oil plantations. By obtaining the land rights and establishing the Rimba Raya Biodiversity Reserve, the project prevented this destruction from happening. Along with safeguarding the ecosystem within the project boundaries, the Rimba Raya Reserve also acts as a physical buffer zone for Tanjung Puting National Park, preventing it from encroachment and exploitation.

Even with the reserve in place, peat fires, illegal logging, and encroachment by oil palm plantations still present very real threats. The project is taking steps to prevent and respond to these threats earlier by building a network of guard posts and fire towers, establishing fire breaks, funding daily patrols, and acquiring airboats and other equipment designed for combatting peat swamp fires. Local community members will be trained and hired as guards and fire fighters to support these activities. 

The project will also regenerate areas that were previously degraded. Nurseries will be created to produce native seedlings and villagers will be paid to plant them. An agro-forestry program will also be launched as part of these rehabilitation efforts. The fruit, nut, spice, and rubber trees will generate income and provide a reliable food source for communities as well as orangutans. To date, over 300,000 trees and 20,000 mangroves have been planted in the reserve.

Funds will also be used to support Orangutan Foundation International’s ongoing orangutan rehabilitation and release activities. This includes the reintroduction of 300 rehabilitated orangutans back into the wild. Three new orangutan release centers and six feeding platforms will be constructed within the Rimba Raya Reserve to provide a staging ground for their migration into the national park

Along with protecting the land itself, the project is also addressing the root causes of community-based deforestation in neighboring villages. Most villagers earn their living from fishing in the Seruyan River, but increased flooding has caused fishing yields to decrease in recent years. Many community members live in extreme poverty, unable to afford the day-to-day cost of living. 

Beyond the employment opportunities noted above, the project is creating alternative livelihood opportunities that will provide residents with a sustainable income stream. The project is building the capacity of local people, particularly women, to take on livelihoods in chicken farming, shrimp paste production, and handicrafts. Microloans provided by the project will remove the financial barriers that typically prevent those living in poverty from starting their own enterprises.

Along with supporting new income generating opportunities, the project also is also improving local quality of life by:

• Implementing a floating clinic that can deliver medical services to communities up and down the Seruyan River who do not have access to healthcare facilities.
• Distributing clean water filters to families and installing village-level water purifying systems to reduce deaths from waterborne illnesses. 
• Providing clean cookstoves that require half the amount of fuel wood as traditional stoves and generate less smoke and indoor air pollution. 
• Increasing access to education by providing scholarships to high school students, creating village libraries, and distributing reading glasses to community members with vision impairments. 
• Increasing production of fruits, vegetables, and fish by training farmers on sustainable production practices, providing aquaponics systems, and developing plantations of pineapples and other crops. 
• Providing solar lanterns to families and installing large solar generator systems in villages that lack electrification. 
• Organizing cleanups and establishing a recycle bank to reduce pollution in villages and enhance the water quality of the Seruyan River. 

By maintaining the reserve and tackling social issues such as poverty, hunger, and disease, the Rimba Raya project ensures that environmental conservation and community development go hand-in-hand.

Located along the Madeira River, this project is protecting a vast area of the Brazilian Amazon that is under imminent threat of deforestation. By improving living conditions and strengthening environmental monitoring and awareness, this project will conserve this critical ecosystem while improving quality of life for local communities.

The Madeira River is one of the Amazon’s largest tributaries. The waterway runs more than 2,000 miles, serving as an important freshwater source and route for transportation in the Brazilian Amazon.

While major transportation routes like the Madeira open up access to more remote areas of the rainforest, this also means that they make deforestation easier. Oftentimes, this results in a fishbone pattern of deforestation, where parallel lines of deforestation occur off a main road.

The Trocano Araretama project is located on the banks of the Madeira in the Municipality of Santo Antônio de Borba. This area is home to an incredible array of animals including 2,500 species of birds and 2,500 species of fish. Howler monkeys, white-nosed sakis, jaguars, and river dolphins are just a few of the species that are found here. 

Unfortunately, this biodiverse region faces severe threats of deforestation. Along with the Madeira River, the area also borders major roadways, leaving it highly susceptible to illegal logging, the expansion of livestock farming and cattle ranching, and other drivers of deforestation. The lack of economic opportunities in the region exacerbate this problem as local communities resort to working for illegal logging companies in order to survive. Between 1991 and 2010, Borba’s population more than doubled, placing further pressure on the region’s precious forest resources. 

Without intervention, it is projected that there will be extensive deforestation in the project area within the next 20 years.

This project is protecting more than one million hectares of the Brazilian Amazon from being lost to deforestation. By conserving this essential ecosystem, the project will ensure that the trees hold their current carbon stores and continue to remove emissions from the atmosphere. 

The project will prevent deforestation and address its root causes through a variety of activities, including:

• Implementing a new, technology-driven monitoring and intervention system against the perpetrators of illegal deforestation.
• Educating local communities on forests to foster environmental appreciation and activism.
• Training and employing local inhabitants in land maintenance and conservation. 
• Providing alternative livelihood opportunities for local people so that they no longer need to engage in illegal logging as a means of survival. In the longer-term, funds will be used to provide micro-loans and develop sustainable ecotourism.
• Training residents on sustainable practices, such as small-scale sustainable agricultural practices that avoid the devastation caused by slash and burn.

The project funds will also be used to create additional benefits for communities and improve local standards of living. As there is currently no waste management in place, proceeds from the project will be used to establish sewage and waste systems. Furthermore, funds from the project will support the improvement of basic services, such as the deployment of mobile health units, distribution of water purification systems and renovation of schools, as well as the provision of professional training.

Mikoko Pamoja is a community-based project that is protecting and restoring mangrove forests along Kenya’s southern coast. By conserving these valuable blue carbon ecosystems and creating livelihood opportunities, the project is fostering marine health and improving the resilience of coastal communities. Funds from carbon offsets support community initiatives that supply clean drinking water, improve schools, and more.

Between 1985 and 2010, about 20% of Kenya’s mangroves were lost. In some peri-urban areas along Kenya’s coast the rate of deforestation was upwards of 70%. This is largely due to over-harvesting since mangrove wood is a cheap and durable building material. Additionally, many families rely on open fires for energy and use mangrove wood as fuel. As the local population continues to rapidly grow, the pressure on Kenya’s remaining mangroves will only intensify. 

Studies show that, pound for pound, mangrove forests sequester four times more carbon than rainforests. Most of this carbon is stored in the soil, but when the mangroves are destroyed it is released into the atmosphere. It is estimated that mangroves account for up to 10% of global deforestation emissions, even though they make up less than 1% of the world’s forests. 

Mangroves are an essential part of marine ecosystems and provide a variety of benefits in addition to storing carbon. The mangroves that grow along Kenya’s coastline serve as important breeding and nursery grounds for fish and other marine species. They also act as a natural buffer between land and sea – filtering pollutants from coastal water, defending communities against storms, and preventing coastal erosion.  

The loss of mangrove habitats has led to declining fish stocks, which are a vital source of income and food for Kenya’s coastal communities. Furthermore, without the protection of mangroves, Kenya’s coastal areas will be at greater risk of erosion, flooding, and other hazards brought on by climate change.

Mikoko Pamoja is a community-based project that is conserving and restoring mangroves in Gazi Bay along Kenya’s southern coast. Mikoko Pamoja means “mangroves together” in Swahili. The project protects 290 acres of mangrove forest by educating locals on their importance, engaging community members in forest monitoring, and strengthening the enforcement of existing regulations. The projects will further discourage the over-harvesting of mangroves by promoting the use of clean energy stoves and establishing community woodlots where locals can source alternative wood products for their construction and fuel needs. 

Along with conserving existing forests, local communities are restoring degraded mangrove sites through reforestation. In 2022, community members came together to plant 1500 mangrove seedlings to help restore the degraded areas of Gazi bay.

The reforested mangroves support coastal biodiversity and enhance the health of connected ecosystems, such as seagrass beds and coral reefs. Their sturdy roots and stems will help stabilize shorelines and prevent sedimentation, leading to better water quality. The newly planted and conserved mangroves will also absorb carbon and store it in their soil and biomass. 

Along with supporting conservation, the projects improve the well-being of the 1,000 people that live in the local villages. Funds generated from carbon offset purchases are channeled into community development initiatives including supplying clean water, renovating schools, and providing books and medication. The project is partnering with other organizations to provide low carbon cookstoves for villagers, as well as creating a plastic waste management system to keep the mangroves clean. They are also looking to pursue income generating opportunities such as beekeeping. Because these economic activities depend on healthy mangroves, they provide a financial incentive to continue with conservation efforts.

This project helps Tanzania’s indigenous communities safeguard their natural resources and prevent their land from being converted into cropland by encroachers. In addition to preserving their forested homeland and traditional lifestyles, the project provides the communities with a new income stream and funds social initiatives that improve access to education and healthcare.

Forests are essential natural resources for Tanzania’s indigenous communities, such as the Hadza and Datooga tribes. These semi-nomadic forest dwellers maintain traditional lifestyles that are closely intertwined with the environment. 

The Hadza have lived in northern Tanzania’s Yaeda Valley for 40,000 years and are one of the last remaining hunter-gatherer tribes on the planet. They engage in a subsistence lifestyle, living off the land and foraging for wild foods like honey, berries, and tubers. The Datooga on the other hand are a pastoralist community that raise their livestock in the forest. Unlike the destructive practices often used by industrial farmers, the Datooga graze their cattle in a sustainable way. Their grazing patterns mimic natural wildlife movements, lessening the impact and allowing the forest to regenerate. While the Hadza and Datooga maintain different ways of life, both communities have a deep connection to the forest and depend on its health for their survival. From providing food and medicine to holding spiritual value, there isn’t a tree without a purpose. 

In recent decades, the communities were gradually displaced from their land. The Hadza and Datooga lived in temporary shelters and had no formal land ownership, making it easy for encroachers to come and take over their land. Prior to the project, the Hadza lost about 90% of their land to outside settlers who cleared the woodland areas primarily for subsistence farming. More recently, the Datooga land has been converted by encroachers to grow onions. Because the farmers used unsustainable agricultural methods, the soil quality quickly degraded, leading them to clear plot after plot of land. This deforestation and land-use change not only threatens the existence of the Hadza and Datooga peoples, it also generates carbon emissions that contribute to global climate change.

This community-led project is protecting over 270,000 acres (110,000 hectares) of drylands forest in and around Tanzania’s Yaeda Valley and Eyasi landscape. The project area forms an essential wildlife corridor which connects to the Ngorongoro Crater Highlands, a critical habitat for an immense population of animals. The project reduces the amount of carbon emissions released through deforestation by preventing the Hadza and Datooga’s ancestral lands from being converted into cropland. 

The project strengthens the communities’ land rights and helps them safeguard their natural resources from encroachers. The primary way the project accomplishes this is through the creation of village land use plans. These new plans were created by the communities with the support of the local government. By designating how different areas can be used, they prevent deforestation. While some areas may be used for grazing or farming, others are restricted as protected areas. 

The communities finally gained legal land rights preceding the start of the project. Now, the project aids them in implementing regulations to protect their land. To enhance enforcement of the community by-laws, a police post was built and 142 community members are employed as village game scouts who patrol the forest for poachers or people cutting down trees. 

Since the start of the project, the communities have observed an improvement in the health of the forest, noting that rainfall is better and wildlife is coming back. One study found that Masai giraffe numbers are increasing in the project area, in contrast to the rest of East Africa where the endangered species is largely in decline. In the past year many other animals including elephants, zebras, lions, leopards, and impalas were sighted in the project area.    

In addition to ensuring resource security, the project allows more than 64,000 remote community members to access a new stream of finance for sustainable development. The project provided over $500,000 USD in 2022 alone to support community development initiatives. Previously, there were a limited number of secondary schools in select villages, so most community members did not receive an education. The project increases access to education by funding the construction of facilities and covering school fees. Health and wellness is another key area of focus. To improve community well-being, the project has installed school toilet blocks, introduced an ambulance service and outreach clinics, and paid for children’s school meals. Though the Hadza and Datooga’s traditional lifestyles are very much in harmony with the forest, these added social benefits provide an added economic incentive to conserve their land.