Why we started RenewCred

- Abhimanyu Rathi, Founder

Every company story sounds clean in hindsight. A neat problem statement. A crisp solution. A straight line from idea to impact.

The truth is messier.

RenewCred did not begin as a startup idea. It began as a discomfort. A slow growing unease with how climate action was being discussed, financed, and measured, especially in markets like India and the broader Global South.

For years, climate conversations have been full of ambition. Net zero targets. Long term pledges. Bold declarations from companies and governments alike. But when you step away from the press releases and walk into factories, farms, fleet yards, or municipal offices, the story changes. The people actually reducing emissions often struggle to access capital, trust, and recognition. Meanwhile, the people buying climate claims struggle to understand quality, integrity, and impact.

That gap is where RenewCred was born.

The problem we kept running into

Before RenewCred, we worked across climate science, policy, project development, and entrepreneurship. We saw carbon markets up close from multiple angles. What looked elegant on paper often broke down in practice.

Project developers told us the same thing repeatedly. Registration was slow. Verification was expensive. Standards felt distant and rigid. Data requirements were heavy upfront and light after issuance. Once credits were issued, no one really checked again.

Buyers told a different but related story. They were confused. Why did two credits claiming the same outcome differ so much in price. Why did integrity feel subjective. Why did every due diligence exercise feel like starting from scratch.

And regulators and financiers had their own concerns. Double counting risks. Lack of real time data. Inconsistent monitoring. Limited transparency once credits entered secondary markets.

The more conversations we had, the clearer it became that the issue was not a lack of good intent. It was a lack of infrastructure.

Carbon markets evolved in a world where data was scarce, sensors were expensive, and digital systems were fragmented. That legacy still shapes how credits are issued today. Periodic audits. Static documents. One time verification events. Trust built on reputation rather than continuous evidence.

In a world moving toward real time finance and digital accountability, this felt increasingly outdated.

A personal turning point

I remember a moment that crystallized this for me. I was reviewing a project that had issued a meaningful volume of credits. On paper, everything looked compliant. Methodology followed. Audit completed. Credits issued. But when we tried to understand ongoing performance, there was almost nothing. No live data. No easy way to validate continued operation. No mechanism for early warning if things went wrong.

At the same time, I was seeing industries like fintech and logistics transform through continuous monitoring, automated reconciliation, and transparent ledgers. It felt strange that climate finance, which carries such moral and financial weight, was still operating on periodic snapshots.

That disconnect stayed with me. Climate outcomes are not static. Emissions reductions happen daily or they do not. Yet our systems were designed as if climate impact could be frozen in time.

What we believed had to change

From the beginning, we held a few convictions. First, trust in carbon markets cannot be rebuilt through better storytelling alone. It requires better data. Second, verification should not be an episodic event. It should be a continuous process supported by technology.

Third, emerging markets should not be forced to choose between integrity and access. With the right tools, both are possible. Fourth, standards and registries must evolve from gatekeepers into infrastructure providers. Their role is not only to approve but to enable.

RenewCred emerged from these beliefs. We did not set out to create another registry in the traditional sense. We set out to rethink what a registry could be if it were designed today.

Reimagining the role of a registry

At RenewCred, we see a registry as a living system. It should ingest data directly from projects where possible. It should support digital monitoring, reporting and verification rather than rely solely on manual audits. It should make credit lifecycles transparent from issuance to retirement. And it should help financiers and buyers understand risk, performance, and credibility in ways that align with modern financial systems.

This is why we built RenewCred as a technology first platform. Digital MRV sits at the core of what we do. Sensors, APIs, and operational data streams allow us to move from assumptions to evidence. Instead of asking whether a project complied once, we ask how it is performing over time.

This approach does not replace third party verification. It strengthens it. Verifiers gain access to better data. Project developers reduce friction. Buyers gain confidence.

Why we focus on engineered and measurable projects

Another early decision we made was to focus on project types where data can be observed, measured, and verified with high confidence. Electric vehicle fleets. Industrial biochar. Methane abatement. Clean energy systems. Circular industrial processes.

These are not abstract interventions. They generate operational data every day. Energy consumed. Fuel displaced. Material processed. Emissions avoided. By anchoring credits in live or near real time data, we reduce reliance on proxies and assumptions. That matters for integrity. It also matters for scale.

As carbon markets grow, manual verification alone will not keep up. Technology is not optional. It is inevitable.

Building for India and the Global South

RenewCred is deeply rooted in India, and that is intentional.

India and other emerging economies will account for a significant share of future emissions reductions. They will also require enormous amounts of climate finance. Yet global market infrastructure has often been designed elsewhere, with limited sensitivity to local realities.

We wanted to build something that works where infrastructure is uneven, where projects are distributed, and where cost sensitivity is real.

That meant designing systems that lower transaction costs rather than increase them. That meant working closely with MSMEs rather than only large corporations. And that meant respecting the complexity of on ground implementation.

Our work across pilots in biochar, clean mobility, solar, and methane reduction reinforced this choice. High integrity is achievable without exclusion if systems are designed thoughtfully.

Moving beyond offsets as a dirty word

One of the more frustrating trends we have observed is the oversimplification of carbon credits as good or bad. The reality is nuanced.

Poorly designed credits deserve criticism. But well designed credits play a critical role in mobilizing capital, especially in hard to abate sectors and regions.

At RenewCred, we are not interested in defending the status quo. We are interested in improving it.

That means aligning credits with real decarbonization pathways. That means transparency around limitations. And that means integrating credits into broader transition strategies rather than treating them as shortcuts.

Carbon credits are not a substitute for decarbonization. They are a financing tool. Used well, they accelerate change. Used poorly, they delay it.

Where we are headed

RenewCred is still evolving. We are expanding methodologies. Deepening our technology stack. Working with regulators, financiers, and project developers to align standards with real world constraints.

We are also thinking beyond issuance. Credits are only one part of the climate finance puzzle. Ratings, risk assessment, and integration with lending and insurance matter just as much.

Our long term vision is simple to state and hard to execute. To make climate impact measurable, trustworthy, and financeable at scale.

That is why we started RenewCred. Not because the market needed another logo. But because the planet needs systems that work.

Climate action is often framed as a moral challenge. It is also an engineering and governance challenge.Good intentions will not fix broken systems. Data, incentives, and accountability will.

We started RenewCred because we believe those pieces can be redesigned. And because we believe that when they are, capital will follow impact rather than the other way around.