Terra Global Capital and Anew Climate: How a US$640 million carbon deal fell apart
This is a story about a US$640 million carbon deal gone wrong. In just three years it went from accelerating climate finance for the “development of high-quality nature-based solutions” to a complex and messy court case.
Terra Global Capital is a carbon consulting firm that was founded in 2006, by Leslie Durschinger. One of the company’s most notorious projects is the Oddar Meanchey REDD project in Cambodia. The project failed to stop deforestation and was managed in a “near-despotic fashion” by a monk with close connections to the provincial governor and the Forestry Administration.
In June 2022, a company called Anew Ventures II, LLC signed a deal with Terra Bella NBS Carbon Pool, LLC and Terra Global Investment Management, LLC.
Terra Global launched the Terra Bella NBS Fund in January 2023 as “a dedicated investment vehicle for deploying private capital to high-integrity NbS programs in developing countries”.
The deal with Anew was announced in a press release in January 2023:
Anew Climate, LLC (“Anew Climate” or “Anew”), a leading climate solutions company, has committed up to $640 million to Terra Global Capital, LLC (“Terra Global” or the “Company”), a woman-led global leader in developing and financing nature-based climate solutions to produce positive social and environmental impacts.
Anew Climate is majority owned by TPG Rise Climate, which is a private equity company that invests in “innovative climate solutions”. The Executive Chairman of TPG Rise Climate is Hank Paulson, ex-Goldman Sachs, ex-US Treasury Secretary, and a major promoter of the financialisation of nature.
TGP Rise Climate is part of TPG Inc., is a US private equity giant with US$245.9 billion assets under management in 2024.
Anew Climate became the “anchor investor” in Terra Global’s Terra Bella Nature-Based Solutions Carbon Pool. This “carbon pool” aimed to “produce significant climate change mitigation benefits on up to 20 million hectares of improved forest and managed land”.
The timing could hardly have been worse. One week after the deal was announced, The Guardian, Die Zeit, and SourceMaterial published the results of a nine month investigation into forest carbon offsets. The investigation focused on REDD carbon credits certified under Verra’s carbon standard and found that “94% of the credits had no benefit to the climate”.
In court documents, Terra Global’s lawyers argue that The Guardian article “drew false conclusions from flawed research”. But “the damage had been done”. The article sent corporate carbon credits buyers, NBS investors, and Verra “into a tailspin”. REDD carbon prices fell.
Terra Global hacked
In March 2023, things took a strange turn for the worse.
After three US banks failed following bank runs, Terra Global was keen to move US$19 million out of the First Republic Bank. Anew Climate agreed to help out. Terra Global agreed to send the money to Anew Climate’s bank accounts at Bank of America. At a later date Anew Climate would return the money to Terra Global.
The Sydney Morning Herald reports that while this was going on, fraudsters had incorporated three companies in Australia:
31 January 2023: Terra Global Capital LLC Pty Ltd.
2 March 2023: Terra Global Capital LL Pty Limited.
23 March 2023: Terra Global Capital Pty Ltd.
The companies were incorporated under the names of people who had previously been victims of stolen identities. The fake company Terra Global Capital Pty Ltd set up a National Australia Bank account.
Meanwhile, the fraudsters had hacked into Terra Global’s computer system. They intercepted emails between Anew Climate and Terra Global’s chief executive and chief financial officer by diverting the emails to third-party email addresses.
And they set up fake email addresses for Anew Climate executives under @anewclimates.com instead of @anewclimate.com.
The hackers could then send emails from Terra Global’s cloned email addresses to Anew’s genuine email addresses. And Terra Global’s CEO and CFO email addresses were reprogrammed to contact the fake Anew Climate email addresses.
By late March, Anew Climate was holding Terra Global’s money in its Bank of America accounts. Anew Climate was expecting an email from Terra Global asking for the money back.
The hackers used a cloned email of Terra Global’s CFO, Bart Kortum, to write to Anew Climate:
“Please find revised wire instructions for the return of funds we have better insurance with the Australian bank than with First Republic bank to cover the funds. Feel free to use ‘return of funds’ as description. Amounts and bank information can be found in email string below. Copying for your convenience . . . ”
On 6 April 2023, the hackers wrote to Anew Climate, impersonating Kortum: “We confirm safe receipt of the funds in our Australian bank, Thank you. Have a good easter weekend.” US$16.69 million was transferred to the fraudsters’ National Australia Bank account.
In court documents, Terra Global’s lawyers describe their version of events:
In March 2023, following the failure of Silicon Valley Bank and amid concerns regarding a potential run on First Republic Bank, Anew suggested that Terra temporarily move all funds held at First Republic to a different financial institution, and offered to hold these funds in escrow in its own bank accounts. Terra accordingly entrusted to Anew nearly $17 million for temporary safekeeping, of which the majority were funds belonging to Terra’s project partners in Malawi and Colombia. But rather than keeping the funds safe, Anew was fooled by a series of fake emails sent by fraudsters impersonating Terra that provided “revised wiring instructions” asking the funds to be sent to a phony bank in Australia and—without so much as confirming the “revised instructions” in a phone call with anyone at Terra, and despite glaring red flags indicating the fraudulent nature of these instructions—transferred the funds to a the Australian bank account, leading to the near-total loss of the funds.
Terra Global eventually recovered the money. But it took nearly nine months. Terra Global spent “hundreds of thousands in dollars in legal and other fees”, as well as key executives, including Durschinger and Kortum, having to spend “countless hours” working to get the money back.
In addition, according to Terra Global’s lawyers,
Anew’s efforts to recover the stolen funds through the Australian court system resulted in media coverage of the incident, including in one of Australia’s largest newspapers. Anew gave no notice or warning to Terra of this public disclosure and media coverage, leaving Terra blindsided when a large potential investor discovered the media article in its due diligence process. . . .
Anew Climate files a legal complaint against Terra Global
On 1 April 2025, Anew Climate terminated the contract and exited the Terra Bella NBS Carbon Pool. In court documents, Anew Climate’s lawyers write that, “Regrettably, in founding the pool and attempting to scale up its mission, Terra simply bit off more than it could chew.”
The lawyers write that,
Unfortunately, the pool has failed. After almost three years, it has not generated even one carbon credit, and is far from doing so. The pool has purported to enter only one project, and the pipeline is in shambles. Almost all of the core deal targets that were pitched in 2022 have been abandoned.
After 31 days, Terra Global replied to Anew Climate, rejecting the termination’s validity. Terra Global also demanded that Anew Climate provide “collateral” of US$30 million.
On 8 May 2025, Anew Climate filed a complaint against Terra Global Investment Management and Terra Bella NBS Carbon Pool in the Delaware Superior Court. Anew Climate is seeking damages exceeding US$1 million.
Discussions between Anew Climate and Terra Global started in late 2021. Terra Global provided a “deal pipeline” with dozens of REDD projects in s South America, Africa, and Southeast Asia that were “in advanced stages of development” and could issue carbon credits “soon after receipt of a capital investment”.
Anew Climate invested US$10 million in Terra Global Capital, buying a 29% equity stake in the company. In total Anew Climate committed up to US$640 million to Terra Global. This included a US$600 million “payment-on-delivery” agreement to buy carbon credits from projects in the Terra Bella NBS Carbon Pool. Anew Climate subsequently reduced this amount to US$200 million.
On 10 June 2022, Anew Climate signed a Securities Purchase Agreement with Terra Global and an Acquisition and Management Agreement (AMA) that was the “Pooling Agreement”. The AMA was amended on 13 February 2024.
Anew Climate’s lawyers write that, “To date, the Pool has purported to enter just one Transaction.” This project is the COCOMACIA Community REDD+ Project, Choco/Antioquia Colombia. The project covers an area of 695,245 hectares and is anticipated to generate 92 million carbon credits over a period of 30 years.
Terra Global Capital produced the Project Description Document for the project in December 2019. According to the document, the project started on 31 August 2016. On Verra’s registry, the project is listed as “Under development”.
Anew Climate’s lawyers describe the project as “an unprofitable legacy REDD+ project that is rife with verification issues, and which was recently entered over Anew’s objection”.
The lawyers add that “the Pool continues to pursue multiple REDD+ projects that would generate credits that are virtually worthless in the current environment”.
Ultimately, over the past three years, Anew contributed $10 million of capital to TGC, committed a nine-figure sum to the Pool, and paid approximately $2.3 million in management fees and expenses — for no genuine or measurable progress.
Anew Climate’s lawyers also state that Terra’s Global’s “advanced pipeline” was “a mile wide and an inch deep”.
Almost every project has been formally abandoned, including several projects that Terra represented were on the brink of verification. There is no reasonable prospect of the pipeline recovering. As the Pool’s quarterly reports exhibit, the pipeline is dysfunctional, with only a small handful of projects being actively pursued, none of which can provide a realistic estimate for issuance of REDD+ or any other type of environmental credit.
Terra Global’s response
On 20 May 2025, Terra Global filed a motion to dismiss the complaint. The company’s lawyers state that “Anew’s Complaint is a sham, both substantively and jurisdictionally.”
Terra Global’s lawyers write that in December 2024, “Anew refused to meet the very first capital call made to it under the Fund, based on supposed concerns about the pricing of credits for the project, which was not a valid reason to refuse the capital call.”
Terra Global’s lawyers write that the Acquisition and Management Agreement contains a “mandatory arbitration provision” which states that disputes should be resolved by arbitration with the International Chamber of Commerce.
In July 2025, Terra Global attempted to start arbitration with the International Chamber of Commerce. On 11 July 2025, Judge Meghan Adams issued a Temporary Restraining Order in favour of Anew Climate blocking Terra Global’s attempt to start arbitration.
In August 2025, Judge Adams deferred a decision on Terra Global’s motion to dismiss the complaint and on Anew Climate’s request to convert the Temporary Restraining Order into a Preliminary Injunction.
The case continues.