Troy Carter is the CEO and Co-founder at Earthshot. He previously co-founded RIZOME, a pioneer in climate-positive bamboo lumber, and has a background in financing renewable energy and agriculture projects. He is passionate about restoring human relationships with non-human nature and creating scaled institutions that honor the sacredness of life.
Troy was deeply affected by the coral bleaching event in the Pacific in 2015. While living on the Hamakua Coast on the island of Hawai’i, hosting nature retreats and stewarding a 42 acre piece of land, 99% of the coral reef at his favorite freediving spot suddenly died. That event led him to co-found RIZOME, with the goal of decarbonizing the built environment by replacing wood, steel, and concrete with climate- positive bamboo building materials. While he was operating ecosystem restoration projects in Southeast Asia, Troy realized reforestation could be funded by carbon markets, though the project development process was too expensive and complex to scale. He came to the thesis that streamlining the carbon development process for land stewards while increasing rigor and project quality would unlock financing for ecosystem restoration at scale.
Prior to this, Troy founded the first internationally distributed cider company on the West Coast. He sold the company after being disillusioned by consumer packaged goods and alcohol, seeking instead businesses that could achieve deep ecological and cultural impact. He traveled the world, motorcycling across India and hosting retreats in the Salish Sea in remote British Columbia, before meeting his wife in Portugal and moving to Hawai’i. Troy developed a deep love of wild places and healthy intact ecosystems growing up in the Caribbean, 6 months solo climbing in the High Andes in the Atacama desert, and spending the summer sailing across the Pacific Ocean during his undergraduate years studying Economics at Stanford University. These profound nature experiences forged the motivation to build an organization that was healing for the planet.
Earthshot was born during a potent dinner conversation after Patrick’s ecological awakening in Hawai’i, where they began synthesizing their combined expertise in technology and AI, private equity, and carbon markets. This year, while running Earthshot, Troy spent 2 months deep in ceremonial work and building partnerships for ecological restoration with the Yawanawa in Brazil. He loves ocean swimming with marine mammals and hiking with his wife.
