The Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX) has approved an approach that utilizes remote sensing and proprietary GIS analysis to verify carbon credits for agricultural land. The solution is called ClimateVerify, and is part of a Software as a Service offering called ClimateSuite from TeraVista Systems.
The CCX protocol for soil offset credits requires no-till and minimum till production systems in order to capture or sequester atmospheric carbon during crop growth . Allowing the crop residue to remain on and in the soil creates stable organic carbon that does not enter the atmosphere to add to greenhouse gases.
The ClimateVerify solution is less labor intensive of a solution than current on-the-ground methods. The use of aerial imagery with hyperspectral sensors provides a transparent and accurate method to determine offsets, and can scale easily to meet the demands of the federal cap and trade strategy.
The company has partnerships with ESRI, DigitalGlobe and Applied Ecological Services.
