The EU Carbon Removals and Carbon Farming (CRCF) Regulation states that carbon removals or soil emission reductions from carbon farming activities should be compared against a standardised baseline, which shall be representative of the standard performance of comparable practices in similar conditions. The way standardised baselines are determined will largely impact the number of certificates that can be issued. MARVIC has actively contributed to the baseline discussion since the start of the project in June 2023, with two written policy recommendations (November 2023 and May 2024), and several technical meetings with DG Clima, JRC and MRV4SOC. The most important advice for standardised baselines from the MARVIC consortium is:

1. To use a hybrid specific-standardised approach with a soil organic carbon (SOC) model using ‘specific’ soil data (e.g., clay content, initial SOC specific for that field or farm) and ‘standardised management’;
2. To use for the quantification of the baselines the same quantification method as for the project line (a.o., same model, same way of using EO data);
3. To recalculate the baseline at the end of the activity-period to take actual weather conditions into account for both the activity and the baseline.

On October 3, 2024, MARVIC participated in a technical workshop on setting standardised baselines at the JRC in Ispra, Italy. Several partners presented approaches used and applicable in their countries and regions, i.e., Jan Peter Lesschen (Wageningen Research) for the Netherlands, Andrea Ferrarini (Catholic University of the Sacred Heart) for the Emilia Romagna region in Italy, Eric Ceschia and Ahmad Al Bitar (INRAE-Cesbio) for France and Greet Ruysschaert (ILVO) for the region of Flanders in Belgium. The outcomes were compared with the standardised baselines set at EU level by the JRC. The collaborative work with JRC, DG Clima and MRV4SOC continued in a background paper to support the discussion in an online CRCF expert group meeting on Baselines (December 12, 2024). In the expert group meeting three major questions were debated:

1. What is the role of the Commission, of Member States, and of operators in establishing the baseline?;
2. Should the standardised baseline be an ex-ante number set at the start of the activity period, or an ex-post trajectory recalculated at the end of the activity period?;
3. How would early movers be recognised?

The MARVIC project is committed to further work on the topic of baselines and will, together with JRC, MRV4SOC and ORCaSa, organise a break-out session on the topic at the Carbon Farming Summit in Dublin (March 4-6, 2025).