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Application
Form for Carbon Credits (pdf)
Documentation for Agriculture
Carbon Emissions Offsets
Carbon
Credit Payments
Questions & Answers
Documentation for Agriculture Carbon Emissions Offsets
1. Contract includes:
- Application for Participation in Soil Carbon Pool and Agreement for Marketing of Credits.
- Schedule “A”: Alberta Terms and Conditions
- Schedule “B”: Detailed Soil Offset Enrollment
- Schedule “C”: Consent to Release of Records
- Schedule “D”: Transfer of Offset Credits from Landowner to Producer
2. Producer must provide proof of ownership and legal description of the acreage (copy of Permit Book or Crop Insurance agreement), submitted on the application.
3. If rental land is included, the Producer must provide a copy of lease agreement showing that leased acres are under Producer’s control. Schedule “D” must be completed for all rented land.
4. Failure to keep land in compliance throughout the program voids the credits on non-compliant land during the year of non-compliance.
5. Submit annual signed confirmation to Flatlander that you remain in compliance with the program guidelines.
6. Acknowledge that verifiers will be given access to fields and documents as required.
Carbon Credit Payments
Once application filed:
- Review the application and provide notification to the Producer upon approval;
- Compile and aggregate seeded acreage reports from all producers into a Carbon Offset Project;
- Prepare the Project for verification with a third party verifier;
- After the verification process is completed, contact and conduct a private sale to one of the firms requiring to purchase offsets for compliance purposes.
Questions and Answers
1. What is carbon sink?
A carbon sink is any agricultural land or woodlot that is managed in such
a way as to remove more carbon for the atmosphere than it releases.
2. What is a carbon credit?
A carbon credit is all or a portion of a carbon sink that has been offered
for sale to an organization or company that needs to reduce its CO2 emissions
through the purchase of a credit.
3. What is an Aggregator?
Aggregator is any company that collects, combines, completes the administrative
work and brokers the carbon credit.
4. What is a Verifier?
A verifier is a company that has been certified to go out and ensure that
proper protocol has been followed for all carbon projects.
5. Can you clarify what land is eligible for the off-set program?
To be eligible, the land enrolled in the XSO off-set program must be capable of being cropped. If such lands are farmed with row crops during the off-set program period, such crops need to be produced in a compliant no-till manner. XSOs will be issued at the rate of 0.16 metric tons CO2 equivalent per acre per year for black and grey soils (Parkland protocol area) and a rate of 0.088 metric tons CO2 equivalent per acre per year for eligible brown & dark brown soils (Dry Prairie protocol area), to farmers who commit to continuous conservation tillage (defined as continuous no-till, strip till or ridge till) on the enrolled land.
6. Can you clarify the definition of no-till?
For Alberta purposes these practices are as defined in the
Alberta protocols. These definitions are:
| Tillage System | Cropped Land Period2 | Fallow Period3 |
|---|---|---|
| No Till | Up to two passes with low-disturbance openers (up to 38%)4,5 or one pass with a slightly higher disturbance opener (up to 46%) to apply seed, fertilizer or manure6, discretionary tillage of up to 10%5, no cultivation. | No cultivations |
| Reduced Till | Soil disturbance to apply seed, fertilizer, or manure exceeds no till definition and/or one cultivation in fall or spring. | One to two cultivations |
| Full Till | More than one cultivation between harvest and subsequent seeding if no fallow in that period, or, more than three cultivations between harvest to subsequent seeding if fallow. | More than two cultivations |
Notes:
1 The Peace River Lowland ecoregion is contained within
the Parkland zone.
2 Cropped land period applies to the management cycle
that terminates at harvest, (e.g. harvest to harvest defines the
cropped land period). This includes land preparation for seeding
which may occur in the previous fall.
3 Fallow period extends from harvest for one full year
to the next fall.
4 Percentage values associated with openers are based
on maximum opener width (e.g. 5 inch openers actually measure 5.5
inches) divided by the shank spacing of the implement.
5 Additional operation with harrows, packers, or similar
non-soil disturbing implements are accetped. Where a second low
soil disturbance operation is performed it is normally for injection
of fertilizer or manure.
6 Discretionary tillage of up to 10% means that up to
10% of the surface area of a single agricultural field may be cultivated
to address specific management issues. These areas are determined
on an annual basis, meaning that specific areas may change from
year to year.
A general guideline is that after the implement has been through the field, there must still be a substantial amount of surface residue present and the soil disturbance must not be full width. If use of the implement would require that a leveling or smoothing activity follow, it would probably result in too much soil disturbance.
If you have further questions, please contact John Meston at Flatlander Environmental Services Ltd. at 780-448-0033 or by e-mail at:jmeston@cattlefinance.com
