EFM, Anew Climate, and Mast Reforestation Restore 891 Acres of Oregon Forest with Innovative Climate Finance
Henry Creek project demonstrates how carbon finance, active reforestation, and permanent conservation can work together to restore forests, attracting buyers like Shopify and the Arbor Day Foundation.
PORTLAND, OREGON, May 19, 2026 - EFM Investments & Advisory (EFM), Mast Reforestation (Mast), and Anew Climate (Anew) today announced the successful verification and issuance of carbon credits for the Henry Creek Reforestation Project, marking an important milestone for post-fire restoration in Oregon and for the use of innovative climate finance to help restore forests after severe disturbance. The project includes 891 acres of successful post-fire forest restoration on land devastated by the 2020 Beachie Creek Fire near Molalla, Oregon.
Henry Creek is among the first projects developed under the Climate Action Reserve’s (CAR) Climate Forward Reforestation Methodology (v.2.0). Under the CAR methodology, the project developed high integrity carbon removal credits adhering to multiple, strict safeguards, including a permanent conservation easement. The innovative design of the methodology allowed the project to help cover the high upfront costs of site preparation and planting required to support the area’s reforestation.
CAR has certified 575,861 carbon removal credits after an independent third-party validator reviewed the health and growth of seedlings on the property to ensure reforestation efforts were successful. Mast and Anew have delivered credits to early buyers including Shopify, the Arbor Day Foundation, and others whose credit purchases financed the original replanting efforts. In addition to supporting the delivery of credits to early buyers, Anew Climate helped enable early financing for the project prior to planting. A portion of the project's credits remains available for purchase through Anew.
“We're excited to see Mast and its partners complete planting and secure protection for the Henry Creek Reforestation Project, which Shopify has been supporting through our Sustainability Fund since 2022," stated Mitch Selby, Shopify Sustainability Fund Lead. "We paid for the associated credits upfront rather than on completion of the removal to reduce the financing burden and help move the project forward, an important model in reforestation where the majority of removal takes decades.”
“Supporting high‑quality forest carbon projects like Henry Creek directly advances the Arbor Day Foundation’s mission to inspire people to plant, nurture, and celebrate trees,” said Jeremy Manion, Managing Director of Carbon Markets, Arbor Day Foundation. “This project shows what’s possible through strong, values‑aligned partnerships, and highlights the essential role innovative climate finance plays in unlocking long‑term funding for forest restoration that benefits the climate, communities, and ecosystems.”
Recovery Enabled by Climate Finance
Henry Creek is also the first project under the CAR methodology to record a perpetual conservation easement, held by the Center for Natural Lands Management. The CAR methodology recognizes conservation easements as a way to secure the long-term durability of removed carbon and the underlying integrity of the credits by dedicating the land to forest cover and requiring reforestation if major natural disturbance causes substantial loss.
“Henry Creek reflects what active, climate-smart forest stewardship looks like in practice. By bringing together innovative restoration approaches, strong partners, and long-term conservation, this project is helping restore a severely burned landscape in a way that supports carbon storage, forest health, watershed protection, and biodiversity. It is a powerful example of how carbon projects like this can offer leading companies an opportunity to take responsibility for their emissions and deliver lasting value for local communities and the broader landscape,” said Amrita Vatsal, Managing Director of EFM.
“Mast and EFM went the distance on this project, from planning in 2021 through delivery,” said Grant Canary, CEO of Mast. “For me this is a multi-generational win. I grew up in Oregon, swimming in Opal Creek and riding the natural rock water slide with my family, and my father attended Boy Scout camps in the area as a kid. Bringing this forest back carries deep meaning for me beyond the professional accomplishment, and this project demonstrated a new pathway to fund reforestation.”
Reforestation After Unprecedented Fire
The severity and extent of the Beachie Creek Fire was unlike anything the region had experienced before. The area around Molalla, Oregon has historically suffered a few fires, but the Beachie Creek Fire burned more than 100,000 acres over 76 days. Most tree canopies in the area and their seed sources were destroyed, threatening the ability of the forest to naturally regenerate. The fire also burned for such a long time that it depleted nutrients in the soil, contributing to accelerated erosion over the area’s steep and rugged terrain, ultimately leading to devastating impacts for the local watershed.
Reforestation efforts began in 2021 with EFM and Mast working together to re-establish native forest cover and help the site recover with greater resilience to future climate stress. Henry Creek was the first project site for Mast’s proprietary drone-based enhanced seeding technology. Mast deployed more than 1.2 million seeds across nearly 300 acres using this new technology. In addition, more than 825,000 seedlings were planted across the entire project area using traditional methods over the following two years.
To restore the area’s natural diversity of conifers lost in the fire, crews planted a mix of native conifer species, including several firs and other locally adapted species.
The Life of a Forest Returns
The Molalla Watershed is already showing encouraging signs of ecological recovery. Local communities have reported the return of species with important conservation and cultural significance in this new early-seral conifer forest.
The project area—now protected in perpetuity because of the easement and carbon project—provides critical habitat connectivity for forest wildlife. Across the 32 miles of creek that span the project area within the Molalla River watershed, there are significant cold-water inputs and headwaters that support juvenile salmonid habitat. This is critical habitat for federally recognized threatened species like the Upper Willamette River ESU Chinook Salmon and DPS Steelhead Salmon. The return of these species carries profound cultural and subsistence significance to the area’s native communities, whose livelihoods, health, and history are inextricably linked to the salmon runs.
"The biggest wins of the Henry Creek Conservation Easement are a protected buffer for the Opal Creek Wilderness and Bull of the Woods Wilderness and long-term assurance of improved water quality in the Molalla River which sustains numerous endangered salmonid runs," said Sanders Freed, Pacific Northwest Regional Preserve and Restoration Manager for the Center for Natural Lands Management, the entity that holds the perpetual easement on the project.
Press contacts:
EFM Investments & Advisory: Colette Smith, csmith@efmi.com
Mast Reforestation: press@mastreforest.com
Anew Climate: PR@anewclimate.com
EFM Investments & Advisory
EFM is an investment and management firm that acquires forests and implements climate-smart strategies in the Pacific Northwest and beyond. EFM creates value by combining timber production with revenues from carbon sequestration, conservation, recreation and biodiversity. EFM’s investment management business focuses on FSC-certified forests in the US, and its advisory business focuses on cutting-edge natural climate solutions opportunities globally. The firm has two decades of experience, manages more than 200,000 forestland acres, and is expanding to markets where increased funding for climate benefits and ecosystem services can create a competitive advantage and deliver value to investors, local communities and the public.
Learn more at www.efmi.com
Mast Reforestation
As intensifying wildfires destroy more forestland every year, Mast Reforestation is scaling post-wildfire reforestation in Western North America. Mast pioneered restorative carbon removal that combines reforestation with durable biomass burial to remove carbon from the atmospheric cycle. Mast owns and operates two of the largest wild tree seed and seedling nurseries in the West, 150-year-old Silvaseed and Cal Forest, two crucial hubs in the U.S. forestry supply chain for wildfire recovery. Mast grows most seedlings for California and manages most seed for the 11 western states. Since its founding, Mast has restored thousands of acres across California, Montana, and Oregon. Producing an average of 36 million seedlings annually, Mast continues to cultivate and protect the biological legacy of Western conifer forests for future generations.
Anew Climate
Anew Climate, LLC, is a global leader of diverse climate solutions built on the principles of transparency and accountability. We bring innovative products and services to the public and private sectors to help reduce or offset their carbon footprints, restore the environment, and ensure our clients’ investments create economic value as well as durable climate impact. With an expansive portfolio of low and negative carbon fuels, Anew Climate delivers tailored solutions that reduce emissions and accelerate sustainability goals across diverse market segments. Anew is majority owned by TPG Rise, TPG’s global impact
investing platform. The company has offices in the U.S., Canada, Germany, Hungary, and Spain with an environmental commodities portfolio that extends across five continents.