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Biochar is the pathway delivering most of the durable carbon removal credit market, according to this explainer on openlibrary.substack.com. That market share is why this week’s operator news matters: a first credit issuance from crop residue, a seven-year offtake for up to 14,000 tonnes, a $72 million bank note tied to a single plant, and a draft standard from one certifier proposing continuous monitoring of kiln output. These are four separate items, not one chain of dependency. Read together, they show what running a biochar operation now involves beyond the kiln.

What is it? A kiln, a feedstock, and a verification trail

Biochar is charcoal made by heating biomass with little or no oxygen, a process called pyrolysis. The carbon in crop residue that would otherwise rot or burn is locked into a stable solid and applied to soil or other end uses. A credit is issued for the carbon that stays put, after a protocol discounts for how much of the char is expected to decay. The operator’s job is to run the kiln, document feedstock and output, and hand that record to a certifier.

Who’s involved? Producers, buyers, a bank, a certifier, and a protocol comparison tool

Terraton is the producer behind this week’s agricultural-waste issuance. Its buyers are Climeworks Solutions, Climate Impact Partners, Carbonfuture, CUR8 and Terraset, per the issuance announcement. Applied Carbon operates the Texas project behind the Citi note. Carbon Standards is the certifier publishing the monitoring draft. Clean Air Task Force (CATF) built the protocol comparison tool. I covered Climeworks’ move into biochar purchasing in Climeworks Integrates Biochar to Diversify CDR Portfolios.

What just happened? Credits, capital, and a draft rule landed in the same week

Terraton issued its first certified credits from agricultural waste and signed purchase agreements with five buyers, including a seven-year Terraset offtake for up to 14,000 tonnes from future Terraton facilities. The source does not state how many tonnes this first issuance covers.

Citi closed a $72 million, 3.5-year, principal-protected Carbon Removal-Linked Note to support Applied Carbon’s biochar project in Texas. Bank-structured capital is now attaching to one named plant, which is a different financing shape from a buyer prepaying for credits.

Carbon Standards published a draft certification standard under which an industrial biochar plant’s production would be verified through continuous data rather than periodic snapshots. It is a draft. No finalisation or enforcement date is given, and nothing in the sources says Terraton’s or Applied Carbon’s tonnes are certified under it.

CATF released a tool that lets users compare biomass carbon removal protocols side by side. A biochar credit is only as good as the protocol it is issued under, and this tool makes the differences legible to buyers who are not protocol specialists.

What are the open questions? Four things an operator should track

  • Does the Carbon Standards draft keep continuous production monitoring as a requirement when finalised, and what sensors and logging does that demand at plant level? The draft does not yet answer this.
  • What volumes will later Terraton issuances show behind the multi-year offtakes? First issuance plus a 14,000-tonne ceiling tells you the ambition, not the throughput.
  • How does the Applied Carbon note handle delivery shortfalls? The press release describes a principal-protected structure but the operational terms are not public.
  • Which protocol differences does CATF’s tool surface for biochar specifically, and do buyers like CUR8 and Climeworks Solutions use them to price credits differently?

My read: the practitioner’s question is moving from “is this tonne certified” to “what kiln data sits behind it, and how often was it collected”. The draft standard shows where at least one certifier wants that answer to go. Operators choosing monitoring hardware now cannot know the final rule, but they can choose to log more than the current minimum. Cheap insurance, if the draft hardens.

Further reading

Citations

  1. Substack (openlibrary) — this explainer on openlibrary.substack.com — Substack post
  2. Finanzwire — issuance announcement
  3. Citigroup — Citi closed a $72 million, 3.5-year, principal-protected Carbon Removal-Linked Note
  4. Carbon Standards — Carbon Standards published a draft certification standard
  5. Carbon Herald — CATF released a tool