The questions we are asked most often by farmers, biomass owners, carbon credit buyers, funders and other developers. Where the honest answer is that it depends, or that nobody knows yet, we say so. Reviewed monthly alongside our Carbon Removal Brief.
No, not at present. The Carbon Offset Administration System, which is the government registry governing which credits may be surrendered against carbon tax liability, does not currently recognise biochar carbon removal credits or credits certified under Isometric. South African biochar projects therefore sell into international voluntary markets rather than into domestic tax abatement.
This is worth watching rather than treating as settled. Carbon tax Phase 2 began on 1 January 2026 at R308 per tonne of CO2 equivalent, rising to R462 by 2030, and it increases the share of liability that may be settled with offsets. That combination is expected to lift domestic offset demand sharply. If biochar removal credits were to become eligible, it would open a domestic buyer pool at prices well above the current voluntary market.
Roughly EUR 100 to 200 per tonne of CO2 removed, with most transactions clustering between EUR 125 and EUR 150.
The Nasdaq CORCCHAR index, which tracks arm's length transactions on the Puro registry for near-term delivery, has sat between EUR 125 and EUR 145 since 2025. S and P Global assessed United States biochar at around EUR 150 for 2025 delivery and EUR 148 for 2026 delivery. The spread within the wider band reflects feedstock, region, certification standard, and how much audit trail the buyer requires.
The point most buyers miss is that two years of scaling deliveries have not brought prices down. Survey work by CDR.fyi with OPIS expects buyer and supplier expectations to converge to roughly USD 48 per tonne apart by 2030, with biochar holding firmest because supply remains tight.
Approximately 2.5 to 3 tonnes of CO2 equivalent per tonne of high-carbon biochar, and for centuries to millennia. The exact figure depends on feedstock, pyrolysis temperature and residence time, and end use.
Permanence comes from the chemistry rather than from a contract. Pyrolysis converts biogenic carbon into stable aromatic ring structures that resist microbial decomposition, and above roughly 500 degrees those rings condense into polyaromatic sheets that are highly recalcitrant. Registries quantify the durable share as a permanent carbon fraction rather than assuming all of it persists. The European Union framework sets a 200 year permanence threshold for a removal to count as permanent, which biochar clears comfortably.
There is no single right answer, and the choice should be driven by your buyers rather than by certification cost.
The main options are Isometric, Puro.earth, Verra under methodology VM0044, Carbon Standards International including the Global Artisan C-Sink standard for small-scale production, and Rainbow. The Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market has approved three biochar methodologies under its Core Carbon Principles.
Isometric and Puro carry the heaviest digital measurement and verification requirements and command the strongest buyer confidence. Artisan standards are far cheaper to run and suit kiln-based production, but do not attract the same premium. PyroSA certifies its reference plant under Isometric, because the buyers we are building toward test the measurement chain before they test the price.
Yes, in almost all commercial cases. Pyrolysis and thermal treatment of biomass are listed activities under the National Environmental Management: Air Quality Act, and the licensing authority is generally the district or metropolitan municipality rather than a provincial or national department.
Which listed subcategory applies depends on your process and thermal capacity, and more than one subcategory can apply to a single plant, which catches developers out.
The application requires an atmospheric impact report including dispersion modelling by a registered specialist. That modelling needs a frozen plant design and site layout as an input, so it sits later in the engineering programme than most schedules assume. Budget for the specialist cost and, more importantly, for the sequencing. If your design is still moving, the modelling cannot start.
This reflects PyroSA's understanding as at August 2026 and is general information rather than regulatory advice.
Environmental authorisation under the National Environmental Management Act, following either a Basic Assessment or a full Scoping and Environmental Impact Reporting process depending on which listing notice activities your project triggers.
The difference drives your programme. A Basic Assessment typically runs around six months. A full Scoping and EIA can run to eighteen. For most biochar projects this, rather than the air emission licence, is the critical path item and the single largest determinant of the date you can reach financial close.
Site selection influences which route applies, and the choice of site deserves as much attention as the plant itself. Appoint a registered environmental assessment practitioner before you commit to a site, not after, and confirm your own pathway with the competent authority since determinations are site specific.
This reflects PyroSA's understanding as at August 2026 and is general information rather than regulatory advice.
It depends on whether the material is a discarded waste or a commercial by-product, and the distinction changes your regulatory burden significantly.
Under the National Environmental Management: Waste Act, material that has an established market and a productive use is treated differently from material being disposed of. Residue that is contracted, priced and destined for a defined industrial process has a strong case for by-product classification, which reduces waste licensing exposure.
Carbon certification intersects here, because registries assess what would otherwise have happened to the biomass when they test additionality. Resolve the classification before you design the permitting programme rather than after, because it determines which path you are on.
Yes, and there are operating precedents.
Isometric's distributed biomass methodology explicitly accommodates invasive species streams. In August 2026 the accelerator remove signed a pre-purchase agreement with Climitra for biochar removals generated from invasive Prosopis juliflora cleared in Gujarat, India, using geospatial sourcing evidence.
The questions a registry will press on are additionality, meaning what would have happened to that biomass without your project, and chain of custody, meaning whether you can evidence where each tonne came from. Clearing programmes that would have happened anyway, or biomass that would have been left to decompose in the field, produce different answers. South Africa has roughly 25 million hectares under alien plant invasion, so the resource is not the constraint. The evidence chain is.
For agricultural use, yes. Raw biochar applied directly to soil can suppress yield in the first season, because its pore structure adsorbs nutrients and moisture before it releases them.
Charging means loading that structure first, typically by blending with compost or manure and allowing it to mature before application. Many published field trials showing poor or negative results used raw biochar, which reflects poor practice rather than a limitation of the material.
One honest caveat. While charging is well established as agronomic practice, the peer-reviewed evidence specifically comparing charged against raw biochar from the same feedstock is thinner than the confidence with which the industry asserts it. That gap is worth closing with local trials rather than papering over.
Typical commercial application is an establishment dose of around 5 tonnes per hectare followed by annual maintenance applications, but rate should follow a soil test rather than a rule of thumb.
Yes to both, and the accounting is more favourable than for soil.
When biochar is incorporated into concrete, close to 98.5 percent of its organic carbon is retained under built environment accounting, which is materially higher than the equivalent soil pathway. The removal is earned at the point of incorporation, which in practice means at the batching plant, so the measurement chain has to extend to the mixing record.
In August 2026 Carbon Standards opened a public consultation on a European Union CRCF-aligned biochar standard with a dedicated certification track for biochar in cement, concrete and asphalt, which moves this from an argued position to a benchmarked methodology.
One constraint worth knowing: a removal claim generally cannot also be used to market the resulting product as low carbon, because that would count the same tonne twice.
PyroSA builds and operates modular biochar carbon removal plants across Southern Africa, converting waste biomass into certified biochar and durable carbon removal credits.
Our reference plant is co-located with a sawmill in Oudtshoorn in the Western Cape under a ten year feedstock agreement, converting residue that has no higher value use, using slow pyrolysis technology from PyroCCS. It is designed for approximately 1,350 tonnes of biochar and approximately 3,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide removal per year. That plant is the first of a twelve plant platform.
We sell into four routes to market: wholesale biochar, agricultural soil programmes, mine rehabilitation, and cement and concrete. We are a producer and seller of biochar and carbon removal credits rather than an end applicator, and we work with downstream partners who handle blending and application.
If your question is not answered here, send it to johan@pyrosa.co.za. We add the good ones to this page.
This page is general information reflecting our understanding at the date shown. It is not regulatory, financial or investment advice. Regulatory pathways are site specific and should be confirmed with a registered environmental assessment practitioner and the relevant competent authority.