Mast planting hatched plans to restore large-scale forests in wildfires. Investors were paying attention.
Rebuilding after a wildfire is not cheap. Recent wildfires in Los Angelesfor example, it happened up until $164 billion property and capital losses. But the forest restoration also has thousands of acres running millions of dollars, making it a case of Grant Canaria, Co-Founder and CEO Mast plantationtold TechCrunch.
“If you’re a landowner and it takes 60-80 years for those trees to grow, any money manager should literally put your money into something else.”
The biggest cost of planting is dealing with dead burning trees. Often they are cut down, stacked and burned on site. “That’s the cheapest way,” Canary said.
According to Canary, Mast has devised a way for landowners to pay for today’s planting without having to wait decades to harvest wood or claim carbon credits. Instead of burning what remains, the mast collects and buries the trees to prevent rot – selling the resulting carbon credits.
Mast recently raised $25 million to develop a new business, the company told TechCrunch only. The round was led by Pulse Fund and Social Capital with participation from Seven Seven Six. The startup’s first project is in a Montana area affected by the Poverty Flatfire, which took over in 2021.
Biomass burial also avoids sending more soot into the air, but without proper site preparation it can release methane and carbon dioxide.
In most soils, wood collapses like microorganisms munching on cellulose, releasing methane and carbon dioxide.
There is a different approach to mast. Startups bury trees in clay-rich areas that restrict air and water flow and suppress microbial activity. The holes can be up to 30 feet deep and cover up to 3 acres. After throwing dead trees inside, the mast covers the holes using clay and other natural materials, similar to how the landfill is built.
Once completed, the mast races the burial site with a monitor to prevent the wood from breaking down. It also awards the Foundation to view and maintain the site for the next century. This is the minimum period of the resulting carbon credits. If something is wrong, the foundation can do repairs to prevent corruption.
As carbon remains trapped in the tree, the mast can sell up to 30,000 metres of carbon credits, with its revenue planting 900 acres.
Canary founded the Mast as Drone Zed 10 years ago. This used drones to reorganize the area damaged by wildfires, as the name suggests.
He soon realized that low-cost methods for spreading seeds were just part of the problem. The company needs to find a source of seed, and in fact, planting efforts are more successful in planting efforts, not in the seeds scattered across drones. So, the drone Acquired two other businessesSilvecedo and Calforest Nursery, and their names have been changed to Must planting.
In contrast, startups are building their biomass burial business from scratch.
They collect data, develop technology to determine where the fire landscape is where biomass burial should be. According to Canary, the goal is to use the data platform to speed up reforestation at wildfire-covered sites in the western US
“It would take three to five years to do a reforestation project,” he said. “You can accomplish this in six to 12 months.”