_Afforestation_ is _planting new forests_ on land that has not been forested before. _Planting trees_ on empty land is a way to _invest in and increase its value_ and _do good for the planet_. We help _landowners_ like you _earn carbon credits_ from afforestation.

How to start earning carbon income from afforestation?

### 1. Suitability assessment
Fill out an interest form and share the location of your land, we will run our suitability analysis and prepare a free carbon opportunity asessment of your land.

### 2. Agreement and joining the project
We will have a call discussing your land analysis and potential carbon income. Once we have agreed on terms, your lands will be allocated to a project.

### 3. Planting, management and monitoring
We will manage the project with Verra and provide constant support to you with ongoing project monitoring. You plant and manage the forest (independently or with a partner) and cover the cost. 


### 4. Credits issuance and receiving payment
You will receive first income from carbon credits 5 years after planting and then every few years after that. Meanwhile you will continue to manage your new forest and we will build relationships with credit buyers.


Swedbank banner transparent background.png

### Need financing to cover the planting cost?

Swedbank now offers afforestation loans to landowners in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

As an official partner, we offer a sustainability assessment service to support you in preparing the documentation needed for the loan application.

Annual carbon income over rotation length

Annual carbon income over rotation length.png

## When do I get paid? 

Here's an example based on a 10 ha plot in Estonia. 
- Tree species: Birch
- Contract length: 60 years
- Total estimated carbon income: €194 500
- Carbon income paid out until year 27 after planting 
- Plus additional income from timber value

Vestman

Starforest

INVL

### Afforestation is _for you_ if...
- You have empty, non-forested land
- You are willing to plant trees on it
- You want to invest in your land and the environment

### Afforestation is _not for you_ if...

- You already have a legal obligation to plant trees (e.g. after harvesting)
- The land is under conservation rules
- The land is a wetland

### No joining, no exit fees
No joining fees, we cover the cost of analysing your land and setting you up to earn carbon income. All you need to do is plant and take care of your forest. 

### Reliable returns, sooner
Start earning carbon income now. Gone are the days where you have to wait decades for return on your forest.

### We only earn when you do
We only earn our commission when your forest starts generating carbon income. 

Find out how much you could earn from afforestation with our calculator


_All underlying data courtesy of the [Berkeley Voluntary Registry Offsets Database v7](https://gspp.berkeley.edu/research-and-impact/centers/cepp/projects/berkeley-carbon-trading-project/offsets-database), published in February 2023._

First things first...

### How does afforestation fit into the broader carbon credit market?

[Afforestation](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/afforestation) is just one type out of a range of carbon projects, accounting for just over **3%** of all carbon credits issued:
![Afforestation credits represent just 3 percent of all credits.png](https://arbonics-strapi-media.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/Afforestation_credits_represent_just_3_percent_of_all_credits_9b37d90855.png)

### Are all these projects developed according to the same rules?

Not entirely - there are different types of afforestation projects based on various methodologies (a methodology is just a set of rules for how the project should be operated).

The biggest afforestation methodologies currently used in the market are managed by Verra (read more about [Verra and its role in the voluntary carbon markets here](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/abc-verra-and-gold-standard)). They are usually referred to by the rather un-catchy code names AR-ACM003 and AR-ACM001 (you can read the methodologies on [the Verra website](https://verra.org/methodologies-main/), but be forewarned, it is rather dull reading!). Between them, these two methodologies account for 36 million credits (/tonnes of CO2 stored – roughly equivalent to the annual CO2 footprint of 6 million Europeans, or the entire country of [Denmark](https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/denmark)). That represents 64% of all afforestation credits issued, ever.

### Who and where is planting all those trees and generating the credits?

At the end of 2022, there were 178 afforestation projects listed in the Verra registry, of which:

- 5 were inactive or rejected (including one Europe-based project)
- 49 had already issued at least some credits (remember that it can take 5 years for afforestation projects to start issuing credits!)
- The remaining 124 were under development (Arbonics is one of these)

Of all 19.4 million credits issued so far, the majority were generated in East Asia and South America:
![Afforestation credits issued by region.png](https://arbonics-strapi-media.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/Afforestation_credits_issued_by_region_a530a0b885.png)

All these projects...

### Does that mean the market supply is growing rapidly?

Surprisingly, no - despite a large number of projects in development, new credit issuances have dropped in the five years to 2021 (2022 vintage issuances have not yet been published) – suggesting a lack of high-quality afforestation credits entering the market.

![Afforestation carbon credits issued per year.png](https://arbonics-strapi-media.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/Afforestation_carbon_credits_issued_per_year_4327fc17cc.png)

### How big is the afforestation carbon credit market in dollars/euros/yens?

All this talk about the number of credits generated may lead you to ask – okay, but what is the actual ***value*** we’re talking about here? On this, it becomes much harder to find solid data.

However, we can take an educated guess: from our experience, afforestation credits are currently selling for a broad range of prices,  from $20 (generally older vintages and/or lower-quality projects with non-native species or low permanence) to $50/tonne (very high-quality credits). ( Using these as an indicator, the market value of the 2020 vintage ranges from $155M to $388M, and the smaller 2021 vintage from $63M to $157M. While these numbers may not be huge, a few key things to keep in mind:

- Demand in the voluntary carbon market more broadly has increased by nearly 4x over the last couple of years and is likely to continue increasing
- Afforestation is one of the few removal-type carbon credits available on the market today at scale – as a result, while supply has been lagging, demand has grown significantly.
- Prices for carbon credits more generally are expected to increase several times by 2035 – read more in [our overview of carbon credit pricing here](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/where-does-the-carbon-price-come-from).

For more on the voluntary carbon markets and afforestation, please see our [Knowledge Hub](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub). In particular, you might find [this primer on carbon credits](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/what-are-carbon-credits-and-what-makes-a-carbon-credit-high-quality) quite handy, or else wish to dig more into [how the voluntary carbon market functions](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/voluntary-carbon-market).

 If you are ready to jump in and think you have suitable land - [get in touch here!](https://arbonics.pro.typeform.com/afforestation)

For all this talk about afforestation and how it could grow – have you ever wondered how big the market already is, and where the bulk of the projects are?

ABC: afforestation carbon credits in numbers - understanding the market

When talking about afforestation (planting new forests), often among the first questions people ask me is: “How do you make sure you’re not doing more harm than good?” 

This is a very valid question. So let’s tackle this directly - let’s cover the 5 biggest things that afforestation projects could do wrong, and how we can avoid them. 

### 1. Planting non-native trees

The first and possibly most wide-spread issue with large planting projects is planting trees that are not native to the environment where the project takes place. 

Non-native trees can disrupt the balance of the local ecosystem and lead to unintended consequences, such as decreased biodiversity and reduced soil quality.

For example, in some parts of the world, eucalyptus trees have been planted for their fast growth and potential for timber production. However, eucalyptus trees are not native to many of these regions, and their introduction has led to the displacement of native species and the depletion of local water resources. For example, a study of eucalyptus plantations in Argentina by (Phifer et al, 2016) showed that these had far fewer bird species and understory plants compared to native forests and even less than other intensely managed lands, such as blueberry and citrus farms.

![Eucalyptus plantation](https://arbonics-strapi-media.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/Eucalyptus_plantation_8f9cc2783d.png)
###### Large-scale mature eucalyptus plantation. Photo courtesy of Phifer et al 2016.

#### What to do instead

Simple - plant native trees! In much of Europe, this is also regulated by law, with forestry law often limiting the types of trees that can and cannot be planted. But regardless, planting native trees helps make the resulting forest as attractive as possible for a variety of other species, increasing the biodiversity of your forest.

### 2. Planting without a maintenance and survival plan for saplings

Another major issue that afforestation projects can face is the lack of a maintenance and survival plan for saplings. Without a proper plan in place, newly planted trees may not receive the care and attention they need to thrive, leading to high mortality rates and the potential failure of the newly planted forest.

For example, in some projects, saplings are planted without proper soil preparation or irrigation, leading to their death due to lack of water or nutrients. In other cases, the trees may be planted too close together, leading to overcrowding and competition for resources. Or, as has happened in some “plant a tree” style projects, the saplings are simply abandoned after planting, leading to large losses due to the young trees losing the battle to weeds and grass, or simply being eaten by moose.

![Cervacol.jpg](https://arbonics-strapi-media.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/Cervacol_fc02958ce8.jpg)
###### A sapling protected with Cervacol, a popular moose repellent. Photo courtesy of LVM.lv

#### What to do instead

 Make sure to take care of the saplings, especially during the first 3 years post-planting. This includes weed control and protection from moose and other herbivores with a taste for young trees.
 
 ### 3. Maintaining the forest as a monoculture

We’ve all heard this: planting monocultures is **bad**. This makes a great deal of sense: a forest consisting of a single species is not biologically diverse, and it’s more vulnerable to pests and fire. 

This is all true. But there's an important distinction to be made here between **planting** as a monoculture and **maintaining** the forest as a monoculture. 
For example, we might choose to plant spruce saplings, knowing that surrounding birch trees will seed and naturally regenerate small birches between the spruces a few years later. In such a case, while we're primarily planting a single species, we are nonetheless creating a mixed forest by encouraging other species. 

Furthermore, some forests (such as pine) naturally tend to be single-species when it comes to trees - but make up for it by having an abundance of understory species such as blueberries. 

![Monoculture plantations on either side of a native forest](https://arbonics-strapi-media.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/Monoculture_plantations_on_either_side_of_a_native_forest_c703e378f1.png)
###### Monoculture plantations on either side of a native forest. Photo courtesy of Waring/Gonzalez-Benecke for OSU.

#### What to do instead

Encourage diversity of species - both through planting (if practical) and ongoing management practices. This might mean planting at a lower density to encourage natural “infill”, and avoiding clearing out other species during maintenance harvests.

### 4. Planting on land that has unique habitats or high biodiversity value

Not all land can or should be forestland. There are a range of unique biomes - such as alvars, highly diverse semi-natural grasslands etc - which are valuable in themselves. Converting these to forestland could actually ****decrease**** biodiversity. This is why it's important to carefully assess land prior to afforestation and make sure we're only planting on land that could benefit from being converted to forests. 
The best way to do this is through a rigorous, data-based approach - at Arbonics, we've developed our own in-house platform which highlights specific high-value areas as unsuitable for afforestation. As we continue to build out the solution, we are constantly adding more detail about land to make these decisions even more rigorous and data-led.

![Example of data-based land analysis on the Arbonics platform](https://arbonics-strapi-media.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/Example_of_data_based_land_analysis_on_the_Arbonics_platform_688bfcaba7.png)
###### Example of data-based land analysis on the Arbonics platform.

#### What to do instead

Make sure to assess any land that is planned for afforestation - check that it's not listed as a high-value habitat. Avoid planting in ways that might destroy existing biodiversity.


### 5. Planting on land that is essential for food production for the local community

It might be tempting to use the most productive farmland available for afforestation - because that means faster tree growth and therefore more CO2 sequestered, right? However, we can't ignore that land has various roles, and growing food for our communities is a key one. If we turn all farmland to forest, we may cause food insecurity and shortages. This is obviously not a good outcome. 
In order to avoid these negative externalities, we need to use only land that is suitable for afforestation, and also do a risk assessment to make sure we're not harming food production.

#### What to do instead

Focus afforestation plans on land that is not currently used to its highest potential. The best land for afforestation is low-quality or abandoned farmland and pastureland - by keeping tree planting to these plots, we can avoid any potential conflict with food production. 

As a bonus consideration, do not plant on land that has other historical or cultural value - for example, Stonehenge is not a great candidate for afforestation, so we should not be planting there.

How do we avoid unintended consequences when planting new forests? 5 biggest challenges afforestation projects can face and how to avoid them.

Afforestation pitfalls and myths - 5 mistakes to avoid when afforesting

##### Afforestation overview 

- Forestry activity type: planting, forest maintenance, eventual timber harvest (optional)
- Key criteria: non-forest land, not harvested <10 years prior
- Carbon project length: 40-60 years (depends on harvesting cycle)
- Expected credits per ha: 120-350 VCUs
- Expected credit sales price: €25-50 per VCU
- Planting is done by the landowner or their chosen partner 
- Planting costs are covered by the landowner

### What is afforestation?

**Afforestation** refers to planting new forests on areas that were not forested within the last several decades. This is distinct from *reforestation*, which involves planting on areas where forests have been cut or otherwise destroyed (e.g. after a fire). 

Why does this distinction matter? In the Voluntary Carbon Market (see also: [ABC: what is the voluntary carbon market?](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/voluntary-carbon-market)), reforestation after planned harvests is not usually considered additional, and hence you cannot earn certified carbon credits for it.

Afforestation projects can remove CO2 from the atmosphere, increase habitat areas, improve water quality and provide benefits to local communities.

### How and why are afforestation projects certified?

Certification and validation by third parties is necessary if you want your credits to be recognised as high quality and additional; which in turn increases their price (the price differential of certified vs non-certified carbon credits can be as much as 10x). 

Arbonics works with Verra, the largest carbon credit standard in the world. [More about Verra and other verification providers](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/abc-verra-and-gold-standard).

### **How does an Arbonics afforestation project work?**

Any landowner can theoretically start an afforestation project on their own and get it certified. However, certification processes are cumbersome (taking as much as 18 months) and costly (dealing with Verra/other certifier and relevant consultants directly can cost upwards of €50 000 before you earn any credits at all). Arbonics makes the process easier and more affordable by grouping several landowners into a single project and by handling all the relevant paperwork. Additionally, to generate carbon credits Arbonics takes care of data-based monitoring plans, carbon calculations and verification. Arbonics provides this without any upfront fees, instead taking a 10-20% cut on credits generated.

![Land Analysis suitable not suitable screenshot ENG.png](https://arbonics-strapi-media.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/Land_Analysis_suitable_not_suitable_screenshot_ENG_1b2861a9ee.png)

### What do I have to do?

First, consider whether you have any lands you’d be open to plant on (remember it can’t have had forest on in the last 10 years). Additionally, think through whether you’re ready to invest your time and finances into afforestation. Then:
- Let us know that you are interested in working with us 
- If you have suitable lands, we will generate a **Carbon Opportunity Assessment** for you, where we review your land and let you know how many tonnes of carbon you can potentially generate from afforestation on your land.
- We will then agree a planting plan for your lands and move on to discuss contract terms. We’ll then sign the contract.
- You can decide whether you’ll plant on your own or work with a planting partner. If you choose the latter, you will work with the planting partner to agree planting details (e.g. planting time, type of trees planted).
- After signing the contract we will also discuss your planting and management plans. We will also agree on what monitoring data you need to pass on to us (usually the same data that you report to government databases).
- You plant the trees according to your planting plan, monitoring and verification of credits will start according to the agreed plan.
- Depending on whether you choose to receive carbon credits (VCUs) or cash payments, your first pay-out will likely occur in two to five years.

If you haven't already, fill out the introduction form [here](https://arbonics.typeform.com/afforestation) to get started.

Things you need to know about afforestation with Arbonics

How to earn carbon credits with afforestation

##### Monitoring overview
- Initial monitoring involves developing biomass monitoring sites and collecting baseline data (e.g. measuring existing trees/shrubs)
- The number and location of biomass monitoring sites will be minimised using remote sensing technology, and developed by Arbonics
- Landowners must monitor tree growth, timber production, fertiliser use and fire losses every five years

### Why is monitoring important?

Data and its quality are central to all carbon projects, as carbon projects trade data between carbon credit buyers and carbon credit sellers. Carbon credit sellers use data to prove they have generated carbon benefits, while carbon credit buyers use project data to prove they have mitigated greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon projects must use robust monitoring systems, which can withstand the scrutiny of credit buyers and third-party auditors.

### Sources and sinks

Carbon projects are designed as carbon sinks, that is they collect, remove and store carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Carbon projects can also be a source of greenhouse gas emissions if they burn biomass (e.g. prescribed burning to prepare sites for planting), use fertilisers, or accidentally lose stored carbon (e.g. forest fire).

High-quality carbon projects monitor all major carbon sources and sinks, to ensure they aren’t selling carbon benefits while also generating carbon emissions. Forestry-based carbon projects normally monitor the following sources and sinks:
- Above-ground woody biomass (sink)
- Below-ground woody biomass (sink)
- Soil organic carbon (sink and source)
- Wood products (sink and source)
- Biomass burnt (source)
- Fertiliser use (source)

A carbon project's monitoring program involves an initial set-up stage, and then ongoing regular monitoring over the life of the carbon project.

### Initial project monitoring

For a forestry-based carbon project, the initial monitoring stage involves developing biomass monitoring sites and collecting baseline data (e.g. measuring existing trees/shrubs). The number and location of biomass monitoring sites will be developed by Arbonics and depend on expected biomass growth patterns across the project area. Arbonics will minimise the number of physical biomass monitoring sites through careful analysis and effective use of remote sensing technology. Not all afforestation parcels will include physical monitoring sites.

### Ongoing project monitoring

The ongoing monitoring demands of a forestry-based carbon project are similar to national forestry inventory programs required by all European countries. Landowners will be asked to physically measure tree diameter at all designated physical monitoring sites within the project area, at least every five years. Landowners will also be asked to keep annual records of fertiliser use, timber production and fire losses for each afforestation area.

### Summary

Arbonics will work closely with all landowners to ensure all afforestation areas can generate high-quality carbon credits. Arbonics will design the monitoring program, provide access to monitoring technology, complete all remote sensing, complete biomass calculations, and model soil organic carbon over time. Landowners who are managing afforestation areas will measure tree growth, timber production, fertiliser use and fire losses every five years.

What is monitoring and how is it used in afforestation projects?

Monitoring afforestation projects

The two most common terms used in relation to carbon projects are additionality and permanence. Often mentioned in the same breath as carbon credit quality – or thrown about when talking about how to avoid greenwashing – they are key terms to understand for any landowner or credit buyer involved in [the voluntary carbon markets](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/voluntary-carbon-market). So let’s break it down, starting with permanence.

### What is permanence?

In short, permanence is a concept encapsulating how long carbon is tied up for, and what its risk of reversal (i.e. being re-released into the atmosphere) is. Reversal can occur in many ways. In forestry-related carbon projects, the most likely causes for reversal are fire, decomposition, and harvest followed by timber use in short-lifecycle products (such as paper). 

Let’s use the example of an average tree to explore permanence. If you plant a small Norwegian Pine sapling this spring, it will (if all goes well) continue to grow for many decades, pulling CO2 out of the air to convert into biomass. It will store carbon in its trunk, branches, needles, and roots. 

Some of that storage is long-term – such as the trunk, which will last throughout the tree’s lifecycle (50+ years) and even beyond, if the timber gets made into furniture or built into a house. 

Some is short-term – pine needles may fall to the ground and decompose within less than a year of growing, re-releasing CO2 back into the atmosphere. 

So what is the overall permanence of carbon storage in the pine tree? Hard to tell, but as a simple rule of thumb, methodologies used by [verifiers like Verra](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/abc-verra-and-gold-standard) often assume that about half the tree’s total biomass is stored for the full duration of its growth cycle and then harvested. So if our hypothetical pine goes on to grow for 80 years and store a total of 1.5 tonnes of CO2, we could count this as 0.75 tCO2e with permanence of 80 years. 

### How does permanence vary between different types of carbon projects?

In general, afforestation projects have an estimated permanence of 30-80 years. This permanence is calculated mostly based on contract length rather than the potential lifetime of the trees - because for most newly planted forests, the biggest impact on their longevity relates to harvest cycles, rather than a tree’s natural life cycle. Therefore afforestation projects enforce permanence through contracts which require the landowner to keep their forest growing for some specific period. 

Zooming out to look at a broader list of carbon credit types, we see that permanence varies widely between different projects. Projects involving mineralisation (turning CO2 into carbonate and similar minerals) have some of the longest storage durations – in fact, the carbon tied up in this way may well be tied up for ever. 

At the other end of the scale, soil carbon projects are generally estimated to have lower permanence, as the risk of reversal is very high. 

![permanence by type of carbon project](https://arbonics-strapi-media.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/permanence_by_type_of_carbon_project_91e746d8a9.png)

### Why does permanence matter?

At its core, permanence is important because of the duration of CO2 in Earth’s atmosphere. Once additional CO2 is released through any means, the clock starts: [some 60-80% of the released CO2 is absorbed (mostly into oceans) in the first 200 years](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/jan/16/greenhouse-gases-remain-air). The remaining 20-40%, however, will stick around for a long time - from [300 years to upwards of a 1000 years](https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2915/the-atmosphere-getting-a-handle-on-carbon-dioxide/). Note that this doesn’t mean that an individual CO2 molecule stays around that long (they have an average life of 5 years), but rather that the extra CO2 released creates, essentially, a surplus, which takes a while to be absorbed through the carbon cycle. 

Think about it a bit like flooding in city streets after heavy rain: an individual molecule of H20 is easily absorbed by drains, but if a lot of them are released at once, it will take a while for the extra water to drain away through normal means (and if the rain is particularly heavy or the area low, we might need to use pumps to get rid of surplus water). 

This is why we need to consider permanence if we want to sequester CO2 for the purpose of offsetting our overall emissions. If our methods have on average low permanence (<50 years), we are not adequately offsetting the CO2 released, because at the end of the sequestration period, we will have nearly double the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere – whatever we sequestered and released, plus most of the initial CO2 that we were offsetting in the first place and which has yet to be absorbed. 

### Doesn’t that mean we should focus only on very long-term storage, 1000+ years?

Yes and no. In an ideal world, all carbon offsetting would be done via very long-term storage solutions, such as direct air capture (DAC) with geological storage, or enhanced weathering (also known as mineralisation). However, the total global annual capacity for these options is currently in the low five digits of tonnes of CO2. As of 2021, [all the global DAC plants in operation jointly sequestered less than 10 000 tonnes of CO2](https://climatechampions.unfccc.int/companies-are-sucking-carbon-from-the-atmosphere-using-direct-air-capture-how-does-it-work/) annually, and they did so at an average cost of about €500-1000/tCO2e. 

In contrast, to tackle our current and historical emissions, we will need to [remove around 10 gigatonnes](https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/25259/chapter/1) (that’s 1 billion, or 1 000 000 000, tonnes) of CO2, annually, by around mid-21st century. It’s clear that DAC and mineralisation alone will not be enough. 

Nature-based solutions (of which forest-based carbon is one) can fill the gap. While they have lower permanence, they a[re scalable, more affordable, and provide a host of co-benefits](https://www.naturebasedsolutionsinitiative.org/news/ipcc-climate-change-mitigation-report/) such as habitat protection, water purification, timber and other goods, etc. When paired with sufficient safe-guards to ensure permanence is maximised (e.g. via contracts disincentivising the premature harvesting of newly planted forests), forest carbon projects can be an effective way to reduce atmospheric carbon while protecting nature.

Permanence in forest carbon projects and how it varies between different types of carbon projects.

ABC: what is permanence and why is it relevant to forest carbon projects?

There’s no doubt that when you start delving into the world of carbon credits and projects you will come across the word “additionality”. It’s because, alongside [permanence](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/abc-what-is-permanence-and-why-is-it-relevant-to-forest-carbon-projects), it’s an important concept by which the quality of carbon projects and the resulting carbon credits are measured. You can read more on the quality of carbon credits in [this article](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/what-are-carbon-credits-and-what-makes-a-carbon-credit-high-quality). Below is a helpful guide that explains what additionality is, how it is measured and how the concept might evolve in the future.


### What is additionality?

Many people are familiar with the concept of additionality when it comes to financial support from the government. Let’s say the government is giving out funds to improve the insulation of your home to make it more energy efficient. It could be that in order to qualify, there has to be some level of confidence that the renovation would not have happened without the support of these funds. These funds effectively help to ensure that the renovation activity is **additional** to what would’ve happened in their absence; with them, there’s now at least one additional home in the world that’s properly insulated.

The idea is similar when it comes to carbon projects. A carbon project is additional if the activity would not have been carried out without the financial support provided by carbon credits. In other words, the project should not be a business-as-usual scenario and should represent an additional effort to reduce carbon emissions.

### Why is additionally so important?

Additionality is essential because it ensures the integrity and effectiveness of carbon credits as a tool for reducing carbon emissions. Carbon credits are designed to incentivise and encourage the removal and reduction of greenhouse gases (GHGs). If we were to pay for activities that would have taken place anyway, it would undermine the integrity of carbon credits, and they would not deliver the promised benefit of GHG reduction or avoidance.

For example, let's say a company purchases carbon credits for removing GHGs to offset their emissions. If the credits they purchase were not truly additional, then they did not remove the same amount of GHGs emitted. This would mean that instead of balancing the emissions they emitted by removals, no removal took place (or it would’ve happened anyway), leading to a net increase in GHGs in the atmosphere. 

In other words, credit buyers need to be sure that what they paying for is delivering the benefit they were promised. They wouldn’t want to pay for something that would’ve happened anyway.

### How to measure additionally?

If we lived in a world where we could accurately predict the future and know exactly what would’ve happened if we made a different decision in the past, measuring additionally would be easy. Unfortunately, we don’t; but there are a few frameworks that different [verifiers and standards (like Verra)](https://www.arbonics.com/knowledge-hub/abc-verra-and-gold-standard) have put in place to measure and prove additionally.

A key part of this is establishing a baseline, or business-usual, scenario that tries to imagine the activity of the project without carbon project finance and comparing that to the scenario where the carbon project is in place.

#### Using question-based additionality tests

One way additionality can be tested is by asking various questions to understand what would’ve happened without the voluntary carbon market and the project. Start with asking the question “Would this activity happen if the voluntary carbon market (VCM) did not exist”? More specifically if it’s an afforestation project it can be asked “Would afforestation occur on this area of land if the VCM did not exist”? If the answer is yes, then the afforestation activity is not additional. If the answer is no, then the project is additional. But the answer can also be maybe, that’s when it gets interesting, and a few more tests (questions) can be applied:

| Type of test | Questions being asked (afforestation as an example) |
| --- | --- |
| Regulatory surplus test | Is tree planting required by any legislation? |
| Financial test | Is the activity financially attractive without VCM incentives? Are there any other financial incentives for afforestation?  |
| Common practise test | Is afforestation already common without VCM incentives? |
| Barrier test | Is afforestation on this area of land only economically viable or feasible with VCM incentives, and are there no other barriers preventing it from occurring without these incentives? |



If any of these questions can be answered by yes, then there’s a chance the activity isn’t additional. 

Using these questions as tests might leave an impression that additionally is a binary measure but that’s not always the case. There are many factors that can influence additionality (as seen in the table above), which means if any of these change the degree of additionality can also change. This is why rating agencies like [Sylvera measure additionality on a spectrum](https://www.sylvera.com/blog/additionality-carbon-offsets) of ‘very unlikely’ to ‘very likely’.

#### Comparing baselines and continuous assessment of additionality

In recent years, *dynamic baseline measurement* has emerged as a newer alternative to *question-based additionality tests*. In the past, many carbon projects have calculated and used a static baseline - a fixed emissions level (usually established at the start of the project) against which the project's emissions reductions are measured. However, there is growing recognition that this approach may not accurately reflect the actual emissions reductions achieved by a project. As a result, we can expect to see more carbon projects using dynamic baselines, which take into account changes in emissions over time and revisit the established baseline throughout the project. These continuously updated dynamic baselines will enable projects to more accurately measure their emissions reductions and provide more reliable data on their impact. 

At Arbonics, we are choosing this approach as we believe it provides the most accurate information about what is otherwise likely to be happening - for example, we measure the levels of afforestation on non-carbon-project land similar to the plots included in our project.

### The future of additionality

The ways of measuring additionality are constantly evolving and it’s hard to predict the future but here are three key trends worth keeping an eye on:

#### Continued scrutiny

As the global community ramps up its emission reduction and removal efforts, it's becoming increasingly important to ensure that carbon projects are actually delivering real, additional emissions reductions. This means that additionality assessments will continue to be a critical component of carbon offsetting, and we can expect to see a greater focus on ensuring that additionality is accurately assessed and verified.

#### More dynamic baselines

Thanks to the increased scrutiny, verifiers and carbon project developers are looking into new and better ways to measure additionality. This means we will likely see more use of dynamic baselines and ways to track these with the help of technology.

#### Increased focus on the use of technology
Advances in data analytics, machine learning, and remote sensing technology are making it easier to track emissions and assess the impact of carbon projects. This will enable more accurate assessments of additionality as well.


What is additionality? How is it measured and how the concept might evolve in the future?

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