Questions raised about beef offset project

A company has disputed allegations it earned carbon credits while woodland on an offset project decreased.

A carbon-neutral beef producer and a carbon farming expert say there are “questions to be answered” about how a Queensland carbon offset project has earned carbon credits while the area of forest and woody scrub on the project site has decreased.

The project — Armoobilla Regeneration Project — came under scrutiny after supermarket Coles announced last week it would buy carbon credits from the project to offset emissions from its new carbon neutral beef range.

Carbon neutral beef and wool producer Mark Wootton, who does not supply beef to the new Coles brand, said he thought it was “fantastic” the supermarket was encouraging more producers to produce carbon-neutral beef, but he said the “integrity” of any off-farm offsets used to achieve carbon neutrality was vitally important.

He was concerned if consumers came to view carbon projects as “greenwash”, it could cause lasting damage to the carbon-neutral beef industry.

“You’re as good as your credibility in this space,” Mr Wootton said.

ANU Professor Andrew Macintosh says the Armoobilla project is “low integrity”.

Professor says project is ‘low integrity’

ANU law professor and the former head of the Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee Andrew Macintosh assessed the Armoobilla project last week and concluded it was “low integrity”.

Prof Macintosh said his assessment — made using the National Forest and Sparse Woody Vegetation Data (Version 5.0 – 2020 Release) — found the forested area on the site decreasedby 1732ha between 2015, when the project was registered, and 2020. The area covered by sparse woody cover decreased by 3040ha, he said.

During the same period, the project received 226,000 Australian Carbon Credit Units – each ACCU representing one tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent net abatement.

“Those things don’t add up … I would not be trusting that this beef is carbon neutral,” prof Macintosh said.

Other inconsistencies with the project included the fact that it used a method known as the Reforestation Modelling Tool to measure carbon accumulation, prof Macintosh said.

The RMT method, first released in 2013, has been “recalibrated twice” since it was first released, and may be estimating carbon credits for the project at a higher rate than the newer versions of the tool, he said.

New projects are required to use newer versions of the tool, but older projects, such as Armoobilla, are allowed to continue using it, according to the Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources.

“You’ve got to scratch your head and say why (companies are allowed to continue using the RMT tool),” prof Macintosh said. “The best available science suggests that they’ve got better measurements.”

The Weekly Times asked the company behind the Armoobilla Regeneration Project – Ninal Ventures, a subsidiary of Corporate Carbon – why it was still using the RMT measurement method.

In a written statement, Corporate Carbon managing director Gary Wyatt said the company used the RMT measurement method because “at the time of registration of the Armoobilla project, RMT was the required modelling tool … In using the RMT, the Armoobilla project is following the (Emissions Reduction Fund) scheme rules.”

Concerns site could be claiming credits for pre-existing trees

Prof Macintosh said he was concerned the Armoobilla Regeneration Project could be claiming carbon credits for trees that were already on the land when the project was registered in 2015.

“What we can see is that there’s a large proportion of the project area that is remnant vegetation, so uncleared forest and woodlands,” prof Macintosh said.

A question mark hung over “to what extent is this project is being issued credits to grow trees that were already there when the project started”, he said.

When the project commenced, about 30 per cent of the site had no woody cover, prof Macintosh said.

But available information suggested the project was claiming regeneration-related credits on at least 40 per cent or more of the project area, and potentially more than 50 per cent of the site, he said.

The project would be “completely free of any questions” if it was claiming credits on the 30 per cent of the site that had no forest or woody vegetation on it when the project was registered, and if the forest and woodlands on that area had increased over time, he said.

According to his assessment, not only was the project claiming credits for more than 30 per cent of the project area, the area with forest and woodlands had decreased between 2015 to 2020 from 30 per cent of the site to 40 per cent of the site, prof Macintosh said.

The Weekly Times asked Ninal Ventures Pty Ltd the total size of the area on the site it was claiming credits for.

In a written statement, company director Gary Wyatt referred The Weekly Times to the project listing on the Clean Energy Regulator’s website.

This listing does not contain the information requested.

Ninal Ventures director Matthew Warnken says prof Macintosh’s analysis of Armoobillis is “not accurate”.

Company labels professor’s assessment ‘inaccurate’

Ninal Ventures Pty Ltd and Corporate Carbon have disputed prof Macintosh’s findings.

In a statement, Corporate Carbon chair Matthew Warnken questioned the credibility of Prof Macintosh’s assessment methods and said prof Macintosh’s analysis was “not accurate”.

“This data set (the National Forest and Sparse Woody Vegetation Data (Version 5.0 – 2020 Release) is in itself no longer accepted as a reasonable measure of forest cover across a specific project area,” Mr Warnken said.

In response, prof Macintosh said “the National Forest and Sparse Woody Vegetation Data (Version 5.0 – 2020 Release) is the Australian Government’s dataset and it is used for reporting under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

“There are finer resolution datasets that can be used to track woody cover changes – the main one in use by proponents is Sentinel. However, the differences between the National Forest and Sparse Woody Vegetation Dataset (which has 25m x 25m resolution) and Sentinel (which is 10m x 10m) are unlikely to be material for the point we are making and, at present, Sentinel is not used by the Australian Government to report under the UNFCCC,” prof Macintosh said.

Mr Warnken said prof Macintosh was incorrect to claim the forest and woodland area on the site had decreased. Biomass on the project site had instead increased over the project period, he said.

“Our project data, which is the same data set that the Clean Energy Regulator uses to issue Australian Carbon Credit Units, shows that the forest and sparse woody cover across the project area has not decreased since project implementation commenced.

“Rather, as would be expected for a project of this nature, there has been an accumulation of biomass in the project area,” Mr Warnken said.

Carbon neutral farmer Mark Wootton, pictured with his wife Eve Kantor, says the integrity of off-farm offset projects is vital to the growing carbon neutral beef market. Picture: Yuri Kouzmin

“The Armoobilla Regeneration Project is undertaken in full compliance with the Human Induced Regeneration method.

“This method has been certified by the Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee as meeting all the integrity standards of the Emissions Reduction Fund.

“The project has undergone independent third-party audit and oversight from the Clean Energy Regulator,” Mr Warnken said.

Beef producers acting in good faith

Coles has signed up 10 low-emissions Victorian and NSW beef producers, who will initially supply its Coles Finest Certified Carbon Neutral Beef brand.

These producers have already implemented a range of initiatives on their farms to reduce their carbon emissions, and are working together with Toowoomba-based consultancy Integrity Ag & Environment to measure and continue to reduce their carbon footprints.

“I want to really emphasise I’m not criticising the (beef) producers,” prof Macintosh said.

“These people … are trying to do exactly what we want them to do. They’re acting in good faith and are trying to produce a carbon neutral product. At the moment, the technology available to the producers is limited, so have to offset (part of their emissions),” he said.

Prof Macintosh said Coles had a role to play in checking that the offsets it had chosen to support its brand had integrity, but the company was not at fault.

“I would have hoped Coles would do some pretty firm due diligence on their projects before they did their purchases, but Coles is not an expert in the carbon offset game, and it is legitimate for them to rely on the system,” he said.

A Coles spokeswoman in a statement said “offset units purchased for (Coles carbon neutral beef range) program meet the rigorous requirements of the Australian Government’s Climate Active Carbon Neutral Standard”.

A spokesperson for the Department of Industry, Science, Energy confirmed Coles had met the requirements of the Climate Active Carbon Neutral Standard for its beef product.