Advisory
Carbon removal that holds up to scrutiny
Advice on EU carbon removal rules, certification and new biochar projects, from a team behind a certified plant that has worked on the EU framework since 2022.
01 / Why now
The rules for carbon removal are being set now
The EU now certifies carbon removal
The Carbon Removal Certification Framework (Regulation (EU) 2024/3012) sets common rules for certifying removals in the EU. Biochar carbon removal got its methodology in 2026, in Delegated Regulation (EU) 2026/285, and certification schemes are applying for recognition under it.
Removals may enter emissions trading
The EU is revising its emissions trading system, and whether permanent removals should count in it is part of the negotiation. That would change who buys removals and what evidence they ask for.
Buyers ask harder questions
Due diligence now goes beyond the certificate: how long the carbon stays stored, who owns the removal, and whether it could be counted twice.
02 / Services
Where we can help
We work on both sides of carbon removal: we sell removals from a certified plant, and we take part in the industry’s work on the rules while they are drafted.
Policy and regulation
Know what the EU rules mean for your project, before they are final.
- Briefings on the CRCF, its delegated acts and the EU emissions trading review
- Impact assessments of draft rules on your business
- Consultation responses and position papers
- Dialogue with Swedish and EU decision-makers
ForProducers, industry associations and public bodies
Certification and MRV
Monitoring and evidence that hold up in a verifier’s review.
- Choosing a standard: CRCF schemes, Puro.earth, Rainbow, the European Biochar Certificate
- Project design document and life-cycle assessment
- Sampling, lab analysis and permanence evidence, from H/Corg to inertinite reflectance
- Preparing for validation and verification audits
ForNew and existing biochar producers
Product and project development
Turn a residue stream into biochar, heat and carbon removal that pay for each other.
- Feedstock and baseline assessment, from farm residues to sewage sludge and seaweed
- Plant concepts built on the Hammenhög system, with district heating
- Business models with several revenue streams
- Biochar products for soil, growing media and construction
ForMunicipalities, water utilities, farms and energy companies
Innovation and funding
Shape an idea into a fundable project, with the partners to carry it.
- Assessment of ideas and early ventures
- Applications to EU LIFE, Vinnova and regional programmes
- Pre-studies and feasibility studies
- Leadership of projects with many partners
ForRegions, municipalities, startups and research groups
Buying carbon removal
Buy removals you can defend in your sustainability report.
- Quality criteria and due diligence on suppliers
- Purchase agreements and wording for removal claims
- Where removals fit in your climate plan
ForCompanies and public bodies
03 / How we work
Three steps, no surprises
ECOERA also produces and sells carbon removal. We say so when it is relevant to your question, and our advice never depends on buying from us.
A first conversation
Thirty minutes, free of charge. We find out what you need and whether we are the right people for it.
A fixed first deliverable
A briefing, a CRCF readiness check or a review of your project, with scope and price agreed before we start.
Support as you need it
Through development, certification or a funded programme, by the hour or as an agreed package.
04 / Track record
From the field to the rulebook
Working with biochar since 2009, and on the EU framework since 2022.
Current roles
- Member, Biochar Europe’s Advocacy working group
- Member, Biochar Europe’s working group on biochar from sewage sludge
- Board member, Biochar Sweden (Biokol Sverige)
Earlier roles
- Steering group, Rest till Bäst (Vinnova)
- Project management group, BIOAGRO (EU LIFE)
- 2009
Our first biochar field application, near Falkenberg, and our first carbon removal certificate.
- 2010
BIOAGRO, the EU LIFE project behind our residue pellets and biochar, is named one of the four “Best of the Best” LIFE Environment projects of the year by the European Commission. ECOERA sat in its project management group.
- 2011
Presented BIOAGRO, and its next step to biochar, in the European Parliament.
- 2012–13
Expert panel for the International Biochar Initiative’s biochar carbon stability test, and co-author of its Biochar Carbon Stability Test Method (2013).
- 2019–24
1,530 removal credits issued on Puro.earth for this period, all of them since retired.
- 2022
In our feedback on the Commission’s call for evidence for the CRCF, asked for biochar carbon removal to be included and for the framework to build on existing standards such as Puro.earth and the European Biochar Certificate. Read it
- 2023
In our feedback on the CRCF proposal, argued that permanence should be defined by how long carbon is stored, not where. The European Biochar Industry Consortium made the same case. Read it
- 2023
During the Parliament and Council negotiations, briefed Swedish members of the European Parliament and Sweden’s Council negotiators at the Government Offices on a technology-neutral definition of permanent carbon removal.
- 2025
Contributed, in Biochar Europe, to its amendments to the Commission’s draft biochar methodology. Biochar Europe is a member of the Commission’s Expert Group on Carbon Removals.
- 2025
In our feedback on the draft delegated act for permanent removals, proposed inertinite reflectance as the primary test of biochar permanence, with the H/Corg ratio as the fallback. Read it
- 2026
Took our own plant through validation and verification under the Rainbow Standard, at the 100-year permanence tier.
- 2026
The CRCF methodology for biochar is adopted as Delegated Regulation (EU) 2026/285. Our work continues on how permanent removals enter the EU emissions trading system.
- Ongoing
Helping shape the biochar products of Skånefrö, our co-founder and part-owner: from the soil improver sold in garden retail to bulk biochar for farms, gardens and sports pitches.
05 / Case
Rest till Bäst: from residues to products
A project part-funded by Vinnova that ran from 2017 to 2023 with 27 partners, led by Lund Municipality. It showed that common residues can become high-quality biochar, and found uses for it from street trees to stormwater filters.
Raw materials tested
- Pelletised residues from seed production
- Park and garden waste
- Sewage sludge
- Seaweed and algae from beaches
- Restaurant waste from Max Burgers, in a spin-off pilot we coordinated
Uses tested
- Street trees, growing beds and rain gardens
- Green roofs and walls
- Football pitches, including Sweden’s first new pitch built with biochar, in 2020
- Farmland, as a carbon sink and a way to return phosphorus
- Stormwater filters
- Concrete products and new growing media
Our part
- Activity leader, and a seat on the steering group
- Carbon sinks from sewage sludge: pyrolysis at several temperatures, with carbon stability measured by an accredited lab
- Sludge biochar tuned for plant-available phosphorus and low cadmium
- Trading of biochar carbon sinks (co-led): stability calculation and protection against double counting, work that fed into our CRCF feedback
- Contributing to a concept for replicating the Hammenhög plant, with its district heating
- Contributing to business models for biochar in urban green spaces and football pitches
The project’s reports and handbooks are at biokol.org (in Swedish).
06 / People
Who you work with
David Andersson
Leads our advisory work
Co-founder and CEO. Born on a farm, with a background in agriculture. M.Sc. in Molecular Biology (Lund University) and an M.Sc. in Innovation and Entrepreneurship (Chalmers). Helped found Chalmers Challenge Lab, and ran the idea evaluation process at Chalmers School of Entrepreneurship and Chalmers Ventures, which assessed more than 500 early startup and spin-out ideas. Project lead for the Envolve innovation programmes in Halland, and Halland contact point, with MRV experience for carbon sinks, in the RIZ project on regenerative innovation zones.
Bengt-Erik Löfgren
Bioenergy and markets
More than 30 years in the bioenergy industry. Former coordinator of the Swedish Pellet Association. Brought the idea of biochar to ECOERA.
Sven-Olof Bernhoff
Production and agriculture
Former CEO of Skånefrö. Project manager of the EU LIFE project BIOAGRO.
07 / Publications
Methods, books and reports
Our feedback to the European Commission is linked in the track record above.
- Biochar Carbon Stability Test MethodInternational Biochar Initiative, 2013, co-author
- Biochar in European Soils and Agriculture: Science and PracticeRoutledge, co-author of chapter 11, “Current and Future Applications for Biochar”
- Challenge Lab: a transformative and integrative approach for sustainability transitionsInternational Sustainability Transitions conference, 2015, co-author
- Reducing the Carbon Footprint with Better Crop Yields: The Ecoera Biosfair PlatformChapter 11 in Alänge & Lundqvist (eds.), Sustainable Business Development, Chalmers University Press, 2014
- Pre-study on the blue bioeconomy in HallandPre-study for Region Halland, author
08 / Talk to us
Talk to David about your project
Tell us what you are working on; a few lines are enough. We reply with how we can help, what the first step would be and what it would cost. You can also email us at info@ecoera.se.