Offset Projects
Current projects
At Standard Carbon, we only purchase carbon offsets from a project after they have been verified and registered on the Chicago Climate Exchange. This practice guarantees that your carbon emissions are actually balanced.
Future projects once verification is complete
- Sustainable Agriculture-sustainably managed rangeland managed by NCOC
- Renewable Energy-methane capture and power generation managed by Iowa Farm Bureau
Offset Providers
Iowa Farm Bureau
The Iowa Farm Bureau is an organization made up of 153,000 farmers, landowners and other friends of agriculture all over the United States. Faced with issues like soil degradation, high fuel costs and rural flight in the late 1990s, the organization began looking for alternative income sources for its members in the Midwest. Now the Farm Bureau’s carbon credit program is being used by farmers and conservationists across the US.
For more information, visit http://www.iowafarmbureau.com/special/carbon/default.aspx
National Carbon Offset Coalition
The National Carbon Offset Coalition (NCOC) has worked with farmers, ranchers and tribal leaders to develop projects in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas and Nebraska. Standard Carbon will be adding offsets from these projects to our campaign program once they pass verification in September. We are considering partnering with carbon sequestration projects such as permanent grass cover planting and rangeland rehabilitation, in which ranchers commit to sustainable stocking rates and rotational grazing. The NCOC is also being supported by the US House of Representatives through the Green the Capitol Initiative.
Offset projects
Farm Bureau Soil Conservation managed by Agragate
Though gas guzzling SUVs make all the headlines, farmland is one of the largest contributors to global climate change. 40% of total global emissions escape into the air when farmland is tilled to clear room for new crops. Through the Iowa Farm Bureau’s carbon offset program, farmers from commit to using conservation tilling methods in their fields. Rather than plough their fields each year, farmers plant right in the residue left over from last year’s crops, keeping the carbon sequestered in the ground. These regenerative farming techniques prevent erosion of valuable topsoil without decreasing crop yield or profits. Because less heavy machinery is required, fuel prices decrease.
The cropland acts as a powerful sponge, absorbing the equivalent of a year’s worth of driving in just a few acres. Income from carbon offsets compensates farmers for their investment in ecologically appropriate technology and their commitment to reduce greenhouse gases. Over 900,000 acres have been enrolled in the program.
Chariton Valley Biomass Project
Iowa has long been considered the heart of our nation’s grain belt, but few outside the region know that for years, the hills of southern Iowa were covered not with crops, but with grassland. The south’s fragile soil produced relatively low crop yields and couldn’t sustain the intensive corn and soybean crops that flourished in the rest of the state. Instead, southern Iowa’s abundance of hay and grassland were used to raise cattle. In the 1970s, high food prices and government policies designed to encourage farming caused much of the area to be converted to intensive cropland, despite it being marginal land. The result was soil and water degradation and the end of the cattle industry. During the farm crisis of the 1980s, the Conservation Reserve Program paid farmers to return their land to grass, but the cattle industry never recovered. Farmers became heavily dependent on CRP rent checks from the government. Farm income and rural population decreased as sustaining traditional family life became harder and harder for southern Iowans. As farmer John Sellers told the Senate Agriculture Committee in 1999, “Farmers are faced with an impossible choice. Land that should be in grass has no long-term sustainable economic use when placed in grass.”
The Chariton Valley Biomass Project was started to develop new products and uses for switchgrass. Because of its excellent burning qualities, switchgrass has great potential as a source of energy. Because of the cheap price of coal, however, it is difficult for switchgrass to compete in the market at this time. This is where our offsets come in. Switchgrass sequesters more carbon in the ground than crops and replaces emissions producing coal in the power plant, giving the switchgrass added, tangible value over coal and making it economically viable.
The Chariton Valley Biomass Project invests in a new revenue stream for farmers in southern Iowa, prevents further erosion of valuable watershed areas, and supports renewable energy development with a reduction in fossil fuel usage.
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