Carbon Market Watch, WWF EPO and Fern, along with other NGOs, submitted a request for internal review challenging the permanent removals delegated act, in light of the Carbon Removals and Carbon Farming Regulation.

The request for internal reviews allow NGOs and members of the public to request the European Commission to undertake an internal review of an administrative act if it is considered to contravene EU environmental legislation.

The European Commission has up to 22 weeks to reply to the request, according to Article 10(3) of the Aarhus Regulation, providing reasons as to why it is refusing or accepting the proposed grounds for review of its act. If refused, an action for annulment of that decision can be brought by the NGOs before the EU General Court.

Overall, the request lays out evidence that the Commission’s methodologies disregard current science and international norms for quantification, monitoring, and sustainability of bio-CCS and biochar, ignoring impacts on forests and agricultural lands.

The challenge is based on the following six grounds:

• Ground 1: unlawfulness in erroneously counting the storage of biogenic carbon as a removal of GHGs from the atmosphere, while also failing to account for emissions associated with changes in biogenic carbon stocks in the quantification.
• Ground 2: unlawfulness in including in the scope of the quantification methodology for BioCCS certification only those emissions that arise from additional biomass used specifically for the operation of the carbon capture process.
• Ground 3: unlawfulness in excluding methane emissions from storage from the quantification of an activity’s associated GHG emissions when biomass is stored under certain conditions, in breach of Art. 4 CRCF.
• Ground 4: unlawfulness in failing to account for indirect land use change (ILUC) in the quantification certification methodologies in breach of Art. 4 CRCF.
• Ground 5: unlawfulness in failing to set monitoring rules (or lawful monitoring rules) in respect of biochar activities in breach of Art. 6 CRCF.
• Ground 6: unlawfulness in failing to adhere to the sustainability requirements in respect of biomass harvesting and use in breach of Art 7 CRCF.

As it stands, the rules risk promoting activities that could actually increase CO₂ emissions rather than removing CO2 from the atmosphere.