The Blue Carbon Accelerator Fund (BCAF) has launched its second readiness Support Call for Proposals, providing support for design-stage blue carbon ecosystem restoration and conservation projects.

Through its support, BCAF is aiming to increase the global supply of investment-ready coastal blue carbon projects.

Coastal blue carbon ecosystems are among the most efficient natural carbon sinks, capturing and storing two to four times more carbon per hectare than terrestrial forests. They can thereby make a significant contribution to global action on climate change.

What are we funding?

BCAF Readiness Support will provide funding for coastal blue carbon restoration and conservation projects in developing countries. Our goal is to enable the early-phase design, set-up, and implementation of projects in developing countries.

Projects must demonstrate project feasibility for restoration and conservation, and also show the extent to which the project will have measurable outcomes across social spheres, economies, the climate, and wider environmental domains.

Funding is available to non-governmental organisations (NGOs), not-for-profit community groups, universities (and other research-focused institutions) and private sector entities (small to medium type enterprises including social enterprises, start-ups, and project developers).

This Readiness Support will help project developers in developing countries to commence and establish projects in a credible manner, ready for next phase investment by:

• Directly funding activities to kick-off or mature their project;
• Providing capacity building opportunities;
• Supporting technical collaboration between various project developers; and
• Assisting with brokering future investors.

Deadline and funding guidelines

Full eligibility and selection criteria, and information on how to prepare and submit a proposal are accessible in the Readiness Support funding guidelines.

Deadline for the applications is 7 July 2023 (23:59 CET).

The BCAF is expecting to select four projects with maximum funding of AUD $170,000 per project. More information is available here.