Skip to main content
Back to Glossary
Definition

GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard

The GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard sets corporate inventory rules for agricultural land emissions, biogenic products, land and geologic carbon storage, and optional CO2 removals, with traceability, monitoring, uncertainty, and separate-reporting safeguards.

What is the GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard?

GHG Protocol's v1.1 standard covers corporate accounting for agricultural land, biogenic products, CO2 removals, and captured CO2 in geologic storage. It takes effect on 1 January 2027 and excludes forestry and non-productive land uses.

Why does the GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard matter to you?

Requirement 1 applies when your conforming GHG Protocol inventory has significant land-sector activities, removals, or geologic storage. A supplier's soil-carbon removal needs the standard's Scope 3 boundary, traceability, allocation, uncertainty, and monitoring safeguards.

How does the GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard work?

Requirement 5 uses the same land area for emissions, removals, and land metrics. Requirement 17 covers biogenic-product emissions and life-cycle land metrics.

If you report removals, Requirements 19-23 require yearly changes in stored carbon, life-cycle emissions, physical traceability, pool-specific data, quantified uncertainty, no double counting, and loss monitoring. Requirement 31 reports emissions and removals separately.

What mistakes should you avoid?

  • Applying version 1's land-carbon method to forestry products such as wood pulp.
  • Netting removals against emissions instead of reporting them separately.
  • Accepting a supplier removal without traceability, allocation controls, uncertainty, and ongoing monitoring.

Is the GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard mandatory?

Not by itself. Requirement 1 applies to companies meeting its test. A law, reporting rule, or contract may separately require GHG Protocol reporting.

Does it replace the GHG Protocol Agricultural Guidance?

Yes. GHG Protocol says this standard supersedes the Agricultural Guidance on 1 January 2027. The older guidance covered farm emissions, carbon pools, land-use change, and allocation. Use the new standard and guidance from that date.

What should you send when a customer asks about this standard?

Send the version, significance decision, spatial boundary, traceability records, methods, uncertainty, monitoring plan, and separate emissions and removals tables.

Example

Turkey packaging example: Suppose a hypothetical packaging manufacturer in Turkey buys 12,000 tonnes of fibre in 2027: 4,000 tonnes of wheat-straw pulp from agricultural residues and 8,000 tonnes of wood pulp.

The agricultural share is 4,000 / 12,000 x 100 = 33.3%. This is a checkable input, not a significance threshold in the standard. The manufacturer tests the wheat-straw value chain's absolute emissions, trend, and uncertainty, records its conclusion that the activity is significant, and applies the agricultural rules. It does not use version 1 to account for forest carbon in the wood pulp.

For the wheat-straw pulp, it records the sourcing boundary, traceability level, land emissions, land occupation, and biogenic-product emissions. If it reports a supplier's soil-carbon removal in Scope 3, it also records the storage pool, stock-change method, uncertainty, allocation, and monitoring plan.

Where it comes up

GHG Protocol applicability for significant land-sector activities and reported removalsLand Sector and Removals Standard v1.1, Requirement 1 and Table 1.2 (checked 2026-08-20)Official sourceGHG Protocol spatial boundaries tied to physical traceabilityLand Sector and Removals Standard v1.1, Requirement 5 (checked 2026-08-20)Official sourceGHG Protocol accounting for biogenic-product emissions and life-cycle land metricsLand Sector and Removals Standard v1.1, Requirement 17 (checked 2026-08-20)Official sourceGHG Protocol stock-change, traceability, uncertainty, allocation, permanence, and separate-reporting safeguards for removalsLand Sector and Removals Standard v1.1, Requirements 19-23 and 31 (checked 2026-08-20)Official source

Related terms

GHG Protocol

The GHG Protocol is a suite of standards for deciding which greenhouse gas emissions belong in a company inventory, classifying them as Scope 1, 2 or 3, calculating them, and reporting the methods and boundaries used.

GHG removal

A GHG removal is recorded only when a measured land or geologic storage pool gains greenhouse gas taken from the atmosphere, with the result reported separately from emissions, reductions, and carbon credits.

Biogenic carbon

Biogenic carbon is carbon derived from living organisms or biological processes, tracked separately from fossil carbon in product, land and greenhouse gas accounting.

Chain of custody for sustainability claims

A sustainability chain of custody sets the rules for carrying a defined material characteristic through purchases, processing and sales, including what may be mixed, how quantities are converted and which claim the records support.

Sources

  • GHG Protocol

    Version, effective date, applicability, agricultural and forestry scope, land and biogenic-product accounting, removals safeguards, and reporting requirements

    2026-08-20

  • GHG Protocol

    Current v1.1 status, covered activities, and relationship to the companion guidance

    2026-08-20

  • GHG Protocol

    Agricultural Guidance scope and its supersession by the Land Sector and Removals Standard on 1 January 2027

    2026-08-20

Last verified 2026-08-20

Ready to start?

Tell us what you need.

Bring us the sustainability request, reporting deadline, or strategy question you are facing. We will read it and suggest a practical first step, and the first conversation is free.

Get in touch
GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard Definition | Keslio