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What is Alternate Wetting and Drying (AWD)?
Alternate Wetting and Drying (AWD) aims to fundamentally transform traditional rice farming practices with a new approach that could reshape rice agriculture's climate impact.
Unlike conventional rice cultivation, where fields are continuously flooded throughout the growing season, AWD involves periodically drying out rice paddies before re-flooding them during critical growth stages.
Traditional continuous flooding creates anaerobic (oxygen-free) conditions in waterlogged soils, providing the perfect environment for bacteria that produce methane as they decompose organic matter. These stagnant, flooded conditions have made rice farming one of agriculture's largest methane emission sources.
AWD disrupts this cycle by allowing fields to dry to specific thresholds before re-flooding. This practice breaks the methane production, while preserving the benefits of flooding for weed control and nutrient management.
It means AWD achieves methane reductions of up to 50% and reduces freshwater consumption by 40%. Without compromising crop yields.
For farmers accustomed to traditional flooding methods, AWD requires training and monitoring but offers substantial environmental and economic benefits through reduced water costs and carbon market opportunities.
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Why AWD Matters for the Climate
Methane is 85 times more potent than CO₂ over a 20-year period, making it responsible for nearly 30% of global warming since pre-industrial times. While methane has a shorter atmospheric lifespan than CO₂, its immediate warming effect makes rapid methane reduction essential for near-term climate stabilization.
Rice cultivation stands as the second-largest anthropogenic source of methane globally, contributing approximately 11% of total methane emissions, equivalent to 1 gigatonne annually and matching the emissions from the entire global aviation industry. With rice providing sustenance for over half the world's population, demand reduction isn't a viable strategy, making production-side interventions like AWD critical.
AWD implementation can achieve 20-50% methane reduction compared to continuously flooded fields - with some studies showing reductions as high as 70% when combined with other sustainable practices. Given rice's massive cultivation area - approximately 150 million hectares globally - even modest adoption rates could yield significant climate benefits.
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Why AWD Matters for the Carbon Markets
Recent developments in AWD align strongly with recent international climate commitments. The Paris Agreement emphasizes the need for rapid, far-reaching transitions in agriculture, with a number of countries having included agricultural methane reduction in their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).
Over 90% of NDCs covering methane emissions in some way and over 60% including targeted methane abatement measures in the agriculture, waste, and fossil fuel sectors. AWD offers a proven pathway to meet these commitments while supporting food security.
How AWD Projects Generate Carbon Credits
AWD projects generate carbon credits through established methodologies that quantify methane emission reductions. Key methodologies include VCS VM0042, VM51 and Gold Standard’s Methane emission reduction in rice cultivation.
Projects typically generate Verified Carbon Units (VCUs) or Gold Standard credits, with each credit representing one tonne of CO₂-equivalent emission reductions. The permanence of methane reduction, unlike some forestry projects, makes AWD credits particularly attractive to buyers seeking immediate, irreversible climate impact.
Beyond carbon benefits, AWD projects deliver substantial co-benefits. Water savings average 30-40%, crucial in water-stressed regions. Yield stability often improves due to better root development and reduced disease pressure. Community benefits include increased farmer incomes (up to 20% through carbon revenue sharing), enhanced agricultural knowledge, and improved water resource management.
Why AWD Is a High-Integrity Project Type for Carbon Buyers
Carbon Accounting
In terms of carbon accounting, when AWD projects benefit from robust digital monitoring, reporting, and verification (dMRV) systems, they significantly reduce carbon accounting risks. This enables precise tracking of water levels, methane emissions, and practice adoption across thousands of rice fields, increasing accuracy in emission reduction calculations and reducing the uncertainties typically inherent in large-scale agricultural projects.
Permanence
Methane reductions are quantifiable through established scientific methodologies and can be monitored using satellite technology. Unlike some nature-based solutions with uncertain permanence, AWD's methane reductions are immediate and irreversible - hence considered permanent with very low risk and low uncertainty.
Additionality
Additionality is clear, continuous flooding remains standard practice globally, making AWD genuinely additional. The practice change is observable and measurable, reducing baseline risks common in other project types.
Co-benefits
Co-benefits align strongly with UN Sustainable Development Goals, including SDG 2 (Zero Hunger), SDG 6 (Clean Water and Sanitation), SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), and SDG 13 (Climate Action). These additional impacts enhance the overall value proposition and stakeholder support.
Why is now an important time for AWD?
Until now, the challenge in this space is that some legacy methods for carbon crediting came under intense scrutiny and weren't always rigorous. Some projects did very little in the way of measurement and monitoring and were over-credited as a result.
As today’s carbon credit buyers prioritize integrity, those that can develop and credentialize high-quality AWD projects have huge potential.
And what’s changed recently is developers like Mitti Labs innovating in the space, in a way that brings AWD projects to market with significantly more integrity.
What are Mitti Labs doing to innovate in AWD?
Mitti Labs exemplifies successful AWD scaling through technology-enabled community engagement. Operating across India's major rice-producing states, the company has onboarded 30,000 farmers across 30,000 hectares in just one year, demonstrating rapid scalability potential.
The company's integrated approach combines three critical elements: farmer education, advanced monitoring technology, and carbon credit development. Their digital MRV system uses satellite imagery, IoT sensors, and machine learning to track water levels, methane emissions, and crop performance at field level, achieving 95% accuracy while reducing monitoring costs.
Real-world results validate AWD's potential. In Telangana's Warangal region, AWD achieved 37% water savings while maintaining comparable yields—3.14 versus 4.96 megalitres per acre water consumption, with grain yields of 2.5 versus 2.4 tonnes per acre. Similar studies in Haryana showed 19% water reductions with maintained productivity.
This rigorous monitoring and transparent reporting and clear climate impact has earned Mitti Labs important market credibility, giving corporate buyers confidence in the project's ability to deliver real, permanent climate benefits.
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AWD in Asia: Opportunity and Challenges
Asia presents the world's greatest AWD opportunity, hosting over 90% of global rice production across approximately 135 million hectares. Key target countries include India (40 million hectares), China (30 million hectares), Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, and the Philippines. These are markets where water stress and climate policies create enabling conditions for AWD adoption.
India - where Mitti Labs operate - exemplifies both the opportunity and challenge. With the world's largest rice cultivation area but lowest per-hectare productivity, India offers massive scaling potential. However, 54% of the country faces high to extremely high water stress, creating urgent need for water-efficient practices. The fragmented nature of Indian agriculture, with average farm sizes under 2 hectares, complicates implementation but also demonstrates the importance of smallholder-focused approaches.
Water politics significantly influence AWD adoption. In regions where farmers receive free or subsidized water, economic incentives for conservation remain limited. However, as water scarcity intensifies and climate policies strengthen, governments increasingly recognize AWD's strategic value for food security and climate goals.
Key barriers include farmer training requirements, initial monitoring costs, and the need for reliable water access during flooding periods. Successful scaling requires comprehensive support systems combining technical assistance, financial incentives, and community engagement. Digital technologies can reduce monitoring costs and improve accessibility, while carbon finance provides crucial economic incentives for adoption.
Supporting Innovation Through Independent Verification
As AWD and other innovative climate solutions emerge, independent verification plays a crucial role in building market confidence and enabling scale. Sylvera provides essential tools and data that bridge the gap between developing climate technologies and mainstream carbon markets.
For buyers and investors, Sylvera’s Ratings and Pre-Issuance Ratings provide the independent validation and deep due diligence required to procure and invest in emerging projects.
And through comprehensive Ratings and Pre-Issuance Ratings, Sylvera helps the supply-side demonstrate credibility to the market. These ratings evaluate not just the technical merits of emission reduction methodologies, but also the operational capacity to deliver promised outcomes and maintain community safeguards.
If you’d like to learn more about how our trusted ratings, tools and data can help you meet your goals, talk to our team here.
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