A number of articles on the issue of carbon credits--Politico, Civil Eats Modern Farmer, and others. Apparently the Biden administration is moving towards a system of establishing credits for farmers to capture carbon in the soil as part of the effort to minimize climate change. There's questions about definitions, about recognizing existing practices which capture carbon, etc. etc.
What strikes me is the likely impact on the USDA bureaucracy. I assume NRCS will be the lead agency in determining whether a given practice captures carbon, etc. and that data relating to credits will be tied into the GIS system.
I've not studied the issue, but I'm assuming the credits will have monetary value, small at first but increasing. I assume there might be a tie to existing farm programs. Consider the sod/swamp provisions which initiated in the 1985 farm bill with some programs over the years requiring compliance with the provisions as a condition of eligibility for payments. It's easy enough to imagine a requirement for some minimum of carbon capture being added to sod/swamp. I'm not sure these days how the FSA-NRCS collaboration on sod/swamp is working, but carbon capture might put new strains on the relationship, as well as the joint management of GIS data.
During my time NRCS had programs with their responsibilities under sod/swamp because they weren't used to being the "bad guy", making decisions which hurt farmers. The agency's culture was always being the good guy, teaching and helping farmers to do better. Will NRCS be up for carbon capture decisions?
A final concern is fraud. We like to believe producers are honest, and most are. But some aren't, and it's easy enough to imagine a fraudulent collaboration between a farmer and a USDA employee.
[Updated to add a link.]
