Sectoral Scope

14. Agriculture, Forestry, Land Use

Status

Inactive 31 March 2023

Verra has inactivated the methodology as of 31 March 2023 following a regularly planned review under the Methodology Development and Review Process v4.2. The review was initiated in Q3 2022 and determined that updates would be required to align the methodology with best practice and scientific consensus in soil organic carbon (SOC) and agricultural greenhouse gas (GHG) accounting and to address overlap between this and other agricultural land management (ALM) methodologies, specifically VM0042 Methodology for Improved Agricultural Land Management.

No further revisions are planned for methodology VM0017, v1.0.

The following measures apply:

  • Projects validated under this methodology may continue to use it until the next baseline reassessment or crediting period renewal and must then select a different methodology, per Section 3.21 of the VCS Standard, v4.4.
  • Pipeline-listed projects have a grace period of 12 months (until 31 March 2024) to complete validation (for registration and crediting period renewal) or verification (for baseline reassessment).
  • New projects seeking to use the methodology must request pipeline listing on the Verra Registry by 31 March 2023 and complete validation by 31 March 2024.

VM0017 quantifies the GHG emission reductions of sustainable land management practice activities that enhance aboveground, below-ground, and soil-based carbon stocks of agricultural areas. The methodology applies input parameters to analytic, peer-reviewed models to estimate the organic soil carbon density at equilibrium in each of the identified management practices in each land use category.
This methodology applies to projects that introduce sustainable management practices to an agricultural landscape where the soil organic carbon would have remained constant or decreased in time without the intervention of the project.

Watch the webinar (opens on Vimeo.com).

Document History

Assessment Reports

Draft Versions

Public Comment

This methodology was open for public comment from 16 October 2009 until 15 November 2009. Public comments are closed.