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Farm Power
The Climate Trust has contracted to buy the methane emission reductions associated with the installation of an anaerobic digester in Mount Vernon, Washington. The digester collects manure from 1,200 cows at two dairy farms, Harmony Dairy, LLC, and Beaver Marsh Farms. Both farms formerly scraped their manure into uncovered anaerobic lagoons, which generated methane and released it to the atmosphere. The project pipes the manure to a covered digester tank, which captures and combusts this methane in a generator to make renewable electricity. This project was funded primarily by the Washington power plant Invenergy, LLC. The Climate Trust, which was approved as an Independent Qualified Organization by the Washington Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council, was selected to recruit an offset project with funds generated when the power plant applied for an expansion. How the project reduces emissions By capturing and combusting methane in a generator before it is released to the atmosphere, anaerobic digesters destroy methane emissions. Over the course of a century, methane's ability to warm the planet is at least 21 times that of an equivalent mass of CO2. The project, which is projected to destroy slightly more than 2,800 metric tons of methane over ten years, is equivalent to reducing 60,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide. Beyond destroying methane emissions, the Farm Power digester also generates renewable electricity. The Climate Trust does not claim any of the carbon dioxide emission reductions associated with this renewable energy. Why carbon finance was needed Using the performance standard of the Climate Action Reserve's Livestock Protocol and The Climate Trust's project-specific additionality tests, we determined that the carbon financing Farm Power received enabled the implementation of the digester project. Given the extremely low market penetration of dairy digesters in the United States, the Climate Action Reserve determined that any digester built in the United States is additional. Beyond this third-party performance standard, The Climate Trust found that the Farm Power project faced two financial barriers that carbon finance could overcome. First, the loan Farm Power received was contingent upon Farm Power selling carbon credits; offset funding was therefore central to the entire financing package for the project. Second, The Climate Trust determined that the revenue from selling methane emission reductions is essential for paying down the loan.  top |
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Project type: Biodigester Project term: 10 years 
“Offsets make economic sense as well as environmental sense. Offset funding for this manure digester helps reduce operating costs on our partner small- and medium-sized dairy farms.” — Kevin Maas, Co-owner, Farm Power Northwest LLC
Read about how this and other such projects can help preserve family farms. READ BLOG »
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