Welcome to the Agriculture Capital (AC) Mindset’s Climate Solutions Investing Primer, where we offer a point of view on the fundamental principles behind carbon markets. AC is focused on speeding the transition from conventional to regenerative farming with a focus on high quality carbon credits. To do that, we are addressing six key carbon credit quality indicators.
- Quantification
- Leakage
- Permanence
- Additionality
- Upsides
- Exclusivity
Quantification
For years, carbon credits in agriculture were based on data that was expensive to gather, and more useful in academia than in the agriculture field. Credits were issued for practice changes like cover cropping or no-till, predicting carbon sequestration values using complicated models. But to scale a robust, trusted market for agricultural carbon credits, quantification must – and has begun to – evolve. To create the highest quality carbon credits, producers must be able to point to actual measurements of increased carbon in soils and transparently provide that data to partners and investors.
Agriculture Capital has been on a decade-long effort to align investments in the carbon economy, farmland, and food infrastructure with climate responsibility and accountability. To provide the highest-level of assurance of the carbon credit value chain, we have continued to improve measurement and reporting to make the process less cumbersome and expensive but of increasingly high quality and integrity. This ongoing organizational mandate has led us to establish a network of stakeholders who understand the immense value of soil as a climate solution, including important initiatives like the Soil Inventory Project, a neutral, science-led nonprofit building a decentralized, national soil carbon inventory. By cultivating these relationships and amplifying our commitment to rigorous, transparent measurement and reporting, we continue to push forward and refine our approach to carbon quantification and credit integrity.
Historically, Agriculture Capital has practiced indicative measurement, where soil samples are taken at a regular time of year and frequency. Over the years, we have sought a solution based on the same rigor as our own process that delivers scientific measurement accuracy across wider farm acreage. For example, Earth Optics, a leading soil carbon measurement and monitoring platform brings a data-driven, granular, efficient, and scalable approach to carbon quantification and is at the forefront of the shift to scientifically measured and verified agricultural carbon credits.
Earth Optics collects soil samples using stratified sampling plans, tags them with geolocated labels, and sends them to labs for carbon analysis. This process integrates proximal sensing technology and machine learning, constantly improving accuracy through extensive field verification. Their SoilMapper™ machine learning platform enhances the robustness of the quantification, reducing uncertainties and improving confidence in the results.
By conducting annual soil measurements across Agriculture Capital’s, Earth Optics’ extensive physical soil samples with fully digitized chain of custody are compliant with all internationally recognized carbon registries and adhere to the highest measurement standards. All physical project samples are stored in EarthOptics’ Soil Library ready for any audit, retest, and demonstration to back up future carbon accounting claims.
Agriculture Capital’s rigorous approach to carbon quantification anchored by our Earth Optics partnership is setting a new standard for integrity in agricultural carbon credits. Rather than relying on models and estimates, we can now definitively show the increasing tons of carbon stored in our soils each year, illustrated in our annual series of Regenerative Impact Reports, which we began publishing in 2016. By continuing to push forward on accurate measurement, we believe agricultural carbon credits can become a powerful tool to drive investment in climate-smart farming practices while quantitatively showing the impacts of the regenerative practices that we implement on-farm.
For more information, please reach out to acmindset@agriculturecapital.com