ReportThis structure, which inspires other cities like Paris, makes it possible to finance ecologically virtuous projects. It goes further than carbon offsetting.
He points with a touch of pride to the typical landscape that everyone here calls the Green Venice. First, the conches, these small canals which irrigate the Marais poitevin. Then, the rows of pollarded ash and poplar trees that soar to form a vegetal vault. “It is the emblem of the marsh, the image that we see when we walk in a boat”, explains Sébastien Mercier, on his 8-hectare site located in Frontenay-Rohan-Rohan (Deux-Sèvres). But this cathedral of greenery is in danger of disappearing: the 400,000 pollard ash trees in the marsh are doomed, sick with chalarose, caused by a fungus which is gradually destroying them from the inside. “Look, this one is dead”he says, pulling on a large dry trunk that comes off without a sound.
So, to pass on to her 11-year-old daughter this ” heritage ” bequeathed to him by his father, the entrepreneur joined forces with the Marais poitevin regional natural park. More than 450 trees were planted at his home this winter, pedunculate oaks, black poplars, maples, field elms, which bristle timidly behind the ash trees. “We double the row, like that, we allow the ash trees to last as long as possible, because they are biodiversity hotels. The idea is to ensure a smooth transition of the landscape”, explains Sandrine Guihéneuf, the technical director of the park. Cost of the operation: 8,000 euros, financed thanks to a unique arrangement. The money was paid by a company through the La Rochelle Carbon Cooperative, the first local carbon market in France and Europe.
This pilot initiative, which is being emulated in Paris, Bordeaux, Le Mans or Brest, employs five employees, based in a small office in the low-carbon Atlantech district, located in Lagord, in the suburbs of La Rochelle. The operator was created in December 2020 by the heavyweights of the territory: the city, the urban community, the commercial port, the university and Atlantech.
“This technical and financial tool is at the heart of the strategy to reduce emissions in our territory and sequester residual ones”, explains Anne Rostaing, the general manager of this cooperative society of collective interest (SCIC). The task is vast, while the agglomeration of La Rochelle – 28 municipalities and 170,000 inhabitants – set itself an ambitious objective three years ago: to reduce its emissions by 30% by 2030, to achieve neutrality. carbon in 2040, ten years before the national commitment.
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