Brand identity + product + 3D

Membrane: a brand for carbon removal that shows each buyer their tonnes turning to stone

Membrane is a carbon removal company that turns CO2 into stone: dissolved in water and injected into basalt deep underground, most of it mineralises within two years. Each buyer gets a passport for their own batch that shows where it sits, how much is already stone and when it can be retired. We built it from scratch: the name, a world of rock at three scales from a basalt ridge to a single pore, the logo, the passport, a scale-dive film, and the launch on posters, an airport lightbox, a core crate and a field jacket.

Project: An Alterra Studio project: we built the company's brand, product and launch from scratch
Stage: Carbon removal, Series A stage
Services: Naming, world and key art, logo, scale-dive film, tonne passport UI, posters, out-of-home and merch, animated board
Tools: Imagine (our in-house design app), Nano Banana Pro, Seedance, HyperFrames

Brief

The problem and the brief

Nine of ten carbon removal startups say permanent. None shows the buyer where their tonnes are or how much is already stone.

Membrane is a carbon removal company. It dissolves captured CO2 in water and injects it into basalt deep underground, where it turns to stone. Its buyer is the head of climate at a tech company of 500 to 5,000 people, who has a net-zero claim to back and a board that asks whether the carbon stayed down.

The brief, in a founder's words: "Every removal supplier says permanent; a head of climate who signs off a net-zero claim wants to see where her tonnes are, how much is already stone and when she can retire them, and our homepage never shows it."

What the buyer is up against

The research

of the durable carbon removal tonnes contracted so far have been delivered.

Source: CDR.fyi, 2026

78.5%

of all disclosed durable removal tonnes were bought by one buyer, Microsoft, as of April 2026.

Source: CDR.fyi, 2026

>95%

of the CO2 injected into basalt at a test site in Iceland had turned to stone in less than two years.

Source: Matter et al., Science, 2016

Three doubts a head of climate's team brings to the first call

Head of climateI can't prove to the board that the carbon actually stayed down.
AuditorNothing ties these tonnes to a measurement I can check.
CFOWe're paying hundreds of dollars a tonne for something nobody can see.

Logic

The strategy: show the tonnes turning to stone

Gas goes in, stone comes out, and the buyer can watch it happen to their own tonnes: where the batch sits, how much is already stone, and when it can be retired.

Doubt 1 · Stayed down?I can't prove to the board that the carbon actually stayed down.
Her batch, at its depth
The passport follows one buyer's batch underground. The core runs from the wellhead down through the basalt, the batch sits in its band, and white crystal climbs through the black rock as the share that is stone goes up. A window beside it shows the rock at that depth: first a dark pore with gas in it, then pores lined with crystal.
Over 95% of the CO2 injected into basalt in Iceland turned to stone in under two years. The passport shows the buyer that process on her own tonnes.
Doubt 2 · Measured?Nothing ties these tonnes to a measurement I can check.
One record per batch
Each batch has one record: its depth band, a sample of the rock from that band, and four dated steps, injected, mineralising, stone and retired. The step it is on now is the only thing on the screen in ultramarine.
About 3% of the durable removal tonnes contracted so far have been delivered. A buyer should see which step her tonnes are on, and when the next one is due.
Doubt 3 · Can't see it?We're paying hundreds of dollars a tonne for something nobody can see.
Retire it, and hold a piece
Once the batch is stone, one button retires a share of it against the company's claim. The passport's headline changes to the tonnes retired, and a stone-paper certificate follows with a slice of the core set into it.
The tonnes sit underground, out of sight. The certificate gives the CFO the claim in writing and a slice of the rock that holds it.

System

The design system

Basalt, fog and calcite white for everything. Ultramarine is only ever the CO2, and never more than 3% of a frame.

Basalt #141517The rock, type and the dark ground
Slate #3A3F46Quiet surfaces and rules
Fog #C9CBCCThe studio void and the product's ground
Calcite white #F2F1ECStone, paper, type on basalt
Ultramarine #2B3BFFThe CO2 only: the bubbles, the wellhead, the live step

The world. One process at three scales: a basalt ridge, a fist of rock with gas entering a fissure, and a single pore lined with crystal. Each is a cinematic 3D render in one grade, and a scale dive joins them.

Logo. A three-lobed mark, like a pore under pressure, beside a rounded wordmark. Traced to vector exactly as designed and never redrawn.

Type. Host Grotesk for headlines and the product, Atkinson Hyperlegible Next for depths, tonnes and dates.

What we left out. 10 of 10 competitors show water, fields, machines or rock where the product should be, and 8 of 10 use blue or green as the brand colour. Membrane opens on the buyer's batch and keeps colour for the gas.

Membrane key art: basalt pores lined with white crystal, one still dark with ultramarine drops of CO2

The 10-second board, made for LinkedIn and X.

The world in motion: one dive from the rock into a single pore, where the gas turns to crystal.

A black basalt ridge whose lower slopes have turned to white crystal, a small ultramarine wellhead at its foot

CO2 bubbles enter a fissure in black basalt as white calcite spreads across the rock — The same process at two more scales: the basalt ridge, and a fist of rock with the gas going in.

Crystal spreading across the rock, from the board's poster cycle.

A field technician's work jacket with the Membrane mark on a woven chest patch, a wellhead behind

Method

The category audit

We scored 10 funded carbon removal startups on our startup homepage benchmark. They average 11.1 out of 24, and not one shows a buyer their tonnes.

Each homepage was scored on 12 criteria, 0 to 2 each, at 1440 and 390 pixels wide, with five questions adapted for a removal supplier. The group averages 11.1 out of 24 against 14.1 for our wider benchmark, so read the comparison as a guide.

Every page shows the process: water, fields, machines or rock. None names the head of sustainability, none pairs a named buyer with a number of tonnes, and only 1 says what it does in five seconds at both widths. Those are the gaps Membrane's homepage is designed to close.

Homepage score out of 100 (12 criteria, 0 to 2 each): 10 funded carbon removal startups, October 2026

Company A58
Company B54
Company C54
Company D54
Company E50
Company F46
Company G46
Company H38
Company I33
Company J29
Benchmark average, 100 startups59

Alterra Studio startup website benchmark 2026, five questions adapted for carbon removal suppliers. Companies are anonymised.

The offer

What we'd ship

For a real carbon removal company, this is a Brand + Website Build.

Brand: Name check, the world at three scales and its key art, logo, palette and type, and the rule that only the gas is blue
Website: A homepage that opens on a buyer's batch underground, at desktop and phone width
Product: The tonne passport in all five states, from injected to retired, and the certificate
Launch: The scale-dive film, the animated board, posters, an airport lightbox, a core crate and field merch

After this

What's next

Answer the auditor a screen that links each batch to its measurements and the registry record.
Build the homepage opening on a buyer's batch at 1440 and 390, and score it on the same benchmark.