Octopus Energy Generation just tripled down on grasslands as a carbon removal pathway. The renewable energy investor expanded its partnership with nature-based solutions provider Cultivo from $40 million to $100 million, adding $60 million to accelerate grassland regeneration and carbon removal across the United States.
The numbers so far: 650,000+ acres of US grasslands enrolled — roughly the size of Rhode Island. Target: 9 million tonnes of CO₂ removal over 30 years. Cultivo says it’s on track to surpass 2 million acres this year.
The Overlooked Carbon Sink
Grassland pasture covers 659 million acres in the United States — 29% of total land area — and stores over a third of global terrestrial carbon. Yet it barely registers in most CDR conversations, which tend to focus on forests, DAC, and engineered solutions.
The approach here is regenerative grazing: managing how livestock move across grasslands to mimic natural grazing patterns. Done right, it stimulates root growth, improves soil health, and drives carbon into the ground. It’s not new science — ranchers have been doing versions of this for decades. What’s new is the institutional capital and carbon credit infrastructure being built around it.
How Cultivo Works
Founded in 2019 in California, Cultivo uses technology and algorithms to identify high-quality nature-based solution projects globally, then packages them into investment products for institutions and corporations. The platform spans grasslands management, afforestation, agroforestry, improved forest management, mangrove restoration, and biochar.
The grasslands push accelerated after Cultivo acquired carbon grasslands developer Kateri in December, giving it a deeper pipeline of US projects catalyzed by Octopus Energy’s initial commitment.
“This increased capital allows us to continue accelerating the growth of our US grasslands and carbon removal project pipeline at speed and scale,” said Cultivo CEO Manuel Piñuela.
The Permanence Question
Nature-based CDR always raises the permanence question, and grasslands are no exception. Soil carbon can be released if land management practices change — drought, overgrazing, or conversion to cropland can reverse gains. The 30-year timeline on these credits reflects that challenge.
But the counter-argument is scale. You’re not going to build enough DAC plants to cover 659 million acres of grasslands. Nature-based approaches that work with existing landowners and land uses can mobilize enormous areas relatively quickly and cheaply. The key is monitoring, verification, and permanence guarantees — exactly what institutional investors like Octopus demand.
Why It Matters
$100 million is real money in nature-based CDR. It validates the thesis that grasslands — not just forests — deserve serious investment as a carbon removal pathway. And the partnership model, with a major energy investor backing a technology-enabled project developer, could be a template for scaling nature-based CDR beyond the usual small-grant approach.
“We love when technology helps nature do what it does best — cut emissions fast,” said Alex Brierley, co-head of Octopus Energy Generation’s fund management team.
Sources: ESG Today, Morningstar, Agri Investor