Firm Uses Ethereum to Tokenize Sustainable Infrastructure in Fight Against Climate Change
Fasset, a fintech company headquartered in the U.K., has launched what it claims is the world’s first operating system built on the Ethereum blockchain dedicated to the ethical financing of sustainable infrastructure.
- Announced Tuesday, the system is intended to democratize investments in sustainable infrastructure, including the construction of solar power plants, wind farms and fiber optic networks, by tokenizing (creating digital representations of) those assets to make them accessible to a global pool of investors.
- Mohammad Raafi Hossain, Fasset’s CEO and a former technology adviser to the United Arab Emirates' prime minister, told CoinDesk infrastructure assets are some of the most resilient and long-yielding financial assets, continuing to provide dividends long after the project is complete, because they provide important utilities to the public.
- These infrastructural assets are useful and accessible to anyone, he said, irrespective of where they come from, just like a decentralized blockchain.
- In a press release, Hossain said climate change is expected to cost the world economy $7.9 trillion by 2050, and that the need for sustainable infrastructure has never been more urgent.
- The Fasset Enterprise Platform (FEP) enables hard-asset owners in sustainable infrastructure to tokenize their assets for fundraising purposes.
- By moving the entire sustainable infrastructure financing process to the blockchain, the firm intends to improve liquidity in the sector and lower barriers to entry that will enable asset owners to avoid costly middlemen and directly list their assets on exchanges.
- The initiative, inspired by the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals, is a response to rapid climate degradation and the lack of capital entering the sustainable infrastructure sector, which is moving toward a $15 trillion deficit by 2040.
- Fasset’s primary objective is to bridge that deficit with blockchain-backed investments, Hossain said.
- Founded in early 2019, the firm has already won the support of the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Kuwait and Bahrain, and has raised over $4.7 million.
- It also plans to launch a regulated exchange for hard assets in the near future.
Also read: EU-Based Universities Say Blockchain Could Help Meet Paris Agreement Carbon Goals