How PowerSolve is bringing trust into carbon offset projects using SurveyCTO
Meet PowerSolve
PowerSolve Technologies is a carbon project tracking software provider with a comprehensive data management platform for device-based carbon projects.
PowerSolve builds custom digital solutions for project developers and consults for a variety of clients. PowerSolve is currently tracking around 1,500,000 cookstove and water filter devices which have been distributed globally.
Office: Cascavelle, Mauritius
Sector: Environmental/sustainability technology
Use case: Field operations, carbon offset projects
Website: https://www.powersolve.io/
The Challenge: Providing transparent data to verify the impact of carbon offsets
PowerSolve’s digital monitoring, reporting and verification (DMRV) software enables carbon project developers to digitize the management and monitoring of carbon project data with a single source of truth.
Carbon offsets are generated by various types of projects. In this case, offsets represent calculated emissions reductions (ERs) as a result of technological interventions that improve energy efficiency.
If you have not heard of carbon offsets, here’s a quick breakdown:
- Individuals or organizations can compensate for their carbon emissions by purchasing carbon credits to ‘offset’ the pollution emitted from fossil-fuel-burning activities.
- Carbon credits are permits that represent one tonne of carbon dioxide (CO2) or equivalent greenhouse gas (GHG) that has been reduced or removed from the atmosphere.
- Carbon credits must be verified and can be generated by many different types of project activities, including technology-based and nature-based solutions.
- Some examples of carbon offset projects/programs include cookstoves and water filters (aka device-based projects), regenerative agriculture projects, tree planting projects, grassland management projects and waste management projects.
If you are unfamiliar with this type of project, check out Improved cookstoves in South Africa | TASC | tasc.je to see an example of a device-based project.
Device-based projects primarily focus on low-income communities, where people’s lives can be transformed by simply improving the technology they have access to. Unfortunately, like many carbon offset projects, this type of project has not escaped having negative headlines in the news. However, the benefits of these projects, when implemented properly, are significant.
Today, in a market under increasing scrutiny, the quality and integrity of a company’s carbon offsets must be backed by high-quality, traceable data. This data must substantiate project developers’ claims and be able to stand up to rigorous auditing. Transparency, reliability, and trust has never been more important for companies like PowerSolve, their clients, and for carbon credit buyers.
The big question, of course, is how to best accomplish this.
The Solution: Digital data collection that powers better monitoring, reporting, and verification
For PowerSolve, the solution to the traceability issue has come from digital data collection software like SurveyCTO.
Because SurveyCTO directly integrates with PowerSolve, users can access their field-based data collection immediately for real-time insights and analysis.
In addition to data collection, SurveyCTO’s native data quality and data monitoring tools give PowerSolve and their clients the reassurance of capturing reliable data as well as the visibility they need to demonstrate project impact and integrity.
PowerSolve also makes use of SurveyCTO’s ability to capture multimedia data points as well as survey metadata to enhance data transparency. Specifically, they’re able to:
- Track each individually-distributed ER generating device–which includes improved cookstoves, and water filters–through unique IDs
- Monitor each device’s GPS location to ensure they were distributed to the correct households
- Log updates and create version-controlled audit trails to show exactly how and when data changes and devices are monitored
- Use images of barcodes and beneficiaries, captured during implementation as evidence of successful field work
- Restrict users in the field from accidentally deleting or submitting incomplete critical information
- Allow for occasional overrides in-field where problematic data is submitted and immediately flagged for review as it arrives in PowerSolve
The Results
Through their use of powerful digital tools like SurveyCTO and their commitment to data quality, PowerSolve is pioneering a new era of data transparency and integrity in carbon offset programs.
Working together with global carbon project developers, PowerSolve is using SurveyCTO to reduce manual errors, proactively discover and address problems, and accurately document project activities.
Ultimately, this has led PowerSolve to empower their clients with much-needed data transparency. PowerSolve is able to provide granular details of the impact of these carbon offset projects, generating significant downstream benefits, from increased consumer trust to improved project outcomes. Despite the obstacles that the carbon offset market has faced in the past few years, today PowerSolve helps project developers build and scale their environmental impact.
