Landseed is a public benefit corporation that measures ecological condition on protected land and mints Earth Credits — a standardized commodity representing verified ecosystem health. Landseed acts as the verifier and registry, similar to how Verra operates for carbon credits, but captures all 17 ecosystem services across six scientific dimensions aligned with the UN SEEA EA framework.
An Earth Credit is a commodity representing one acre-year of verified ecological condition, normalized to a scientific reference state. Earth Credits are minted based on the Ecological Condition Index (ECI) — a measurement across six dimensions: physical, chemical, compositional, structural, functional, and landscape. Healthier ecosystems produce more credits per acre. Earth Credits are purchased and permanently retired (burned) for ESG compliance, biodiversity commitments, and sustainability goals. Once retired, an Earth Credit is destroyed and cannot be reused.
Nature equity is the financial value captured from ecosystem services on protected land — carbon sequestration, water filtration, biodiversity habitat, flood mitigation, soil conservation, pollination, and more. Landseed's Nature Rights Deed captures these rights as a recorded legal instrument, enabling the creation of Earth Credits that represent this ecological value as a tradeable commodity.
Carbon credits measure one molecule: CO2. One tonne sequestered or avoided, verified against a single methodology. Earth Credits measure the full ecological picture — six dimensions of ecosystem condition covering 17 ecosystem services. Carbon sequestration is one of 32 indicators in the Earth Credit methodology. The difference is structural: a carbon credit captures what a forest sequesters. An Earth Credit captures what a forest is.
A land trust records a Nature Rights Deed on protected property. Landseed measures ecological condition across six scientific dimensions. Based on the Ecological Condition Index and a threat multiplier that adjusts for demonstrated conservation need, Earth Credits are minted. Credits are traded on an exchange and purchased by corporations, governments, and foundations who permanently retire them for sustainability commitments. Revenue flows back to the land trust, funding ongoing stewardship.
Earth Credits provide a new pathway for conservation investment. Unlike traditional philanthropy, Earth Credits are commodities with market-driven pricing. Buyers purchase credits representing verified ecological condition on real, protected land backed by recorded Nature Rights Deeds. Credits can be retired for ESG compliance or held as the underlying ecological condition develops. Contact outreach@landseed.earth to learn more.
The ECI is a composite score from 0 to 1 measuring ecosystem health across six dimensions aligned with the UN SEEA EA framework: physical state, chemical state, compositional state, structural state, functional state, and landscape state. Each dimension is scored against published scientific reference conditions — what the ecosystem looks like when fully intact. Scores are aggregated using a penalized geometric mean that prevents compensability: collapse in any single dimension cannot be hidden by high scores in the others.
A Nature Rights Deed (NRD) is a recorded legal instrument — a deed of conveyance filed at the county level — that grants ecosystem service rights from a landowner to an NRD holder. It captures rights to carbon, biodiversity, water quality, flood mitigation, soil conservation, pollination, recreation, research access, and all other ecosystem services produced by the property. The NRD runs with the land for 100 years and works alongside existing conservation easements as a complementary instrument. In any conflict, the more restrictive provision controls.
No. Carbon sequestration is one of 32 indicators measured by the Earth Credit methodology. Landseed captures the full ecological condition across six dimensions — 17 ecosystem services in total. Earth Credits are a broader commodity. Landseed is the verifier and registry, comparable to what Verra does for carbon but covering the complete ecological picture.
Landseed does not set Earth Credit prices. Earth Credits are traded on an exchange where buyers and sellers determine the price. Each credit carries metadata showing all six dimensional scores, threat level, ecosystem type, and geographic location. The market reads this metadata and prices accordingly. Landseed measures. The market values. These roles are never combined.
Natural capital investment is the allocation of financial resources to protect, restore, or sustainably manage natural ecosystems. Earth Credits provide a standardized commodity for natural capital investment — backed by verified ecological condition on real land, with measurable environmental outcomes and a clear retirement mechanism for sustainability claims.
Earth Credits capture biodiversity through the compositional dimension of the ECI, which measures species diversity, genetic diversity, trophic completeness, and community composition using environmental DNA, acoustic monitoring, and field surveys. Unlike single-species or habitat-only approaches, Earth Credits measure biodiversity alongside the ecosystem functions that support it — providing a more complete and credible basis for biodiversity investment claims.