The lawyer helping in the quest to reduce carbon emissions

Kushal was sure she could take on that responsibility.  To ensure the success of this first-of-a-kind initiative for South Pole, she also called upon the expertise of Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer to advise on the establishment of the fund. This was a highly innovative product, involving the fund returning carbon credits, rather than financial returns, to investors. Kushal was also made company secretary, which meant handling both governance and investor relations. 

And then, as a burgeoning market operating in a space still largely unregulated by governments, South Pole, and the carbon market more broadly, faced multiple black swan events in under a year. That’s when Kushal took charge. “I became a crisis manager and was then made group general counsel and chief compliance officer alongside my role as corporate secretary.” At the same time, she was about to have her second child. Talk about everything happening all at once.

Happily, South Pole came through this challenging period. A new management team came in, the company refined its strategy, and everyone could breathe a sigh of relief. Above all, South Pole sees huge potential in carbon-related businesses. As Kushal explains, carbon credits – which are a key market mechanism ultimately to help reduce carbon emissions – embrace a wide range of technologies, not simply planting more trees. For example, there are carbon removal techniques such as enhanced rock weathering, which can involve spreading carbon-absorbing materials on agricultural land to accelerate co2 absorption, or biochar, a byproduct of biomass processing, as well as direct carbon capture or storage.

Ultimately, this will involve pricing carbon correctly to reflect its cost to the environment such that there is market pressure to reduce carbon emissions because there will be cheaper alternatives or it will spur technological solutions. In the current political environment, that is not going to happen any time soon, Kushal believes, which means that the world will continue to produce fossil fuels, albeit in ways that should be less harmful to the environment. Renewables are also part of the mix, especially with the costs of renewable energy coming down all the time.

“The reality is there's no viable alternative to fossil fuels at the moment,” Kushal says. “And we are at a time of great global destabilisation, not to mention the cost-of-living crisis, so that puts the drive to search for breakthrough alternative energy (such as fusion) on the back burner. However, I am optimistic that change will happen, which means we have to continue to explore all alternate methods of carbon emission reduction and avoidance.”

With things more settled at South Pole, Kushal is enjoying her role enormously. She enjoys “being more than just a lawyer”, working closely with the CEO, CFO and business line executives to steer the company through the ongoing pivot towards regulated compliance markets. 

Kushal was with HSF Kramer for five years from 2016 to 2021, finishing as senior associate in energy and infrastructure finance, working under partner Martin Kavanagh. “That was tremendous fun. The best part about the team was that it was young. We were very entrepreneurial, flexible, and international. We were working on a huge range of emerging markets work, incorporating project finance, infrastructure, commodities, borrowing, base lending, and acquisition finance. Added to that, we were advising clients in many different industries. In all my five years there, I don’t think I did a deal that was a repeat of the previous one. We were constantly pushing boundaries.”

Another aspect that stood out for Kushal was the willingness of partners to share their expertise. Their doors were always open, she says.

She fully expects to instruct Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer in future. As the carbon market matures, there will be scope for sophisticated financing deals, and she looks forward to being involved in yet more first-of-a-kind transactions.