Isometric recently released an update to its Energy Use Accounting Module for carbon dioxide removal (CDR) into public consultation. The module details how to quantify emissions associated with the provision of electricity and heat to CDR projects. In line with Isometric’s modular approach to protocol development, this module is applicable to all CDR pathways—ensuring the rigorous and consistent application of monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) standards for every credit issued on the Isometric Registry.
All CDR projects need energy to function and the provision of energy in the form of either electricity or heat is always associated with emissions into the atmosphere. Some CDR pathways are more highly energy intensive than others. This means that accurately calculating the amount of emissions associated with energy supply to a project is essential to accurately quantifying the number of credits to issue for a CDR activity.
Isometric has adopted a market-leading approach to energy emissions accounting with this updated module. The module establishes a set of rigorous, foundational principles relating to provision of low-carbon power, such as solar and wind. These principles will ensure that energy intensive projects have clear climate impact.
- Additionality: procured power generators should otherwise not have existed in the absence of the CDR project, ensuring low-carbon power is not diverted from other uses.
- Deliverability: procured power should be located within the same energy grid as the CDR project.
- Temporal matching: whenever possible, there should be hourly parity between supply and demand of power to ensure that intermittency of low-carbon power sources, such as solar and wind, is embedded within the accounting methodology.
In today’s energy market, the most common ways of providing power—such as Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) and Energy Attribute Certificates (EACs)—do not feature highly granular timestamps that would facilitate hourly temporal matching. In this module, Isometric presents a tiered approach to this topic that aims to ensure operational feasibility for small-scale CDR projects, while balancing the need for stringent requirements for large-scale projects.
Under the updated module, projects deemed to be operating at a demonstration scale are permitted to procure power supplies according to a traditional volumetric matching approach—provided the project developer proves that high-resolution (hourly) temporal matching is not possible in their region. This provision is limited to small project sizes to ensure that emissions impacts for larger projects are always captured using the most accurate approach possible. Isometric anticipates that the market to facilitate hourly temporal matching will develop rapidly over the next several years and will continue to monitor developments closely to ensure that requirements always represent the best available science.
Energy emissions accounting is currently subject to a large amount of scientific and market-based uncertainty. The industry urgently needs further research to improve the understanding of the grid’s carbon intensity for incremental loads, and how MRV frameworks contribute to the accuracy of CDR carbon assessments. The energy market also needs to rapidly develop and enable innovations to permit granular time stamping of instruments for power provision (RECs/EACs), and functioning systems for liquid trading of these instruments.
Isometric’s in-house Science Team is actively engaged in driving these innovations through collaborations with scientists and industry experts. The updated module provides a pathway for progressively increasing standards over time, in line with anticipated improvements in scientific understanding and market conditions. The module’s approach should provide long-term certainty for CDR project developers and catalyze improvements in standards across the industry.
Malte Feucht, CEO of Phlair, a Direct Air Capture (DAC) technology developer, said: "Robust energy accounting is critical to building a sustainable and responsible CDR ecosystem. We believe Isometric's approach strikes the right balance of rigor and operational feasibility for this stage of the market, and look forward to adopting it for upcoming projects."
Comments on this module are welcome from interested buyers, suppliers and scientists as it enters public consultation and will be considered before finalizing the module.
