What We Miss Without Soil Removals Reporting: From South Dakota’s Sinks to Montana’s Losses

A deeper look at spring wheat

Carbon negative spring wheat is growing in the United States, but most companies’ sustainability disclosures aren’t reflecting it.

Why? Because much of the carbon abatement is from soil carbon sequestration, not emission reductions.

Without the ability to report soil carbon removals, companies often misrepresent the climate benefits of these agricultural systems. While agricultural practices like nutrient management, cover cropping, and conservation tillage can reduce emissions, they also enhance soil’s capacity to suck atmospheric carbon out of the air and store it. This creates the opportunity for crops to act as net carbon sinks, helping to actively reverse atmospheric carbon trends over time when adopted at scale.

Soil removals have been common practice for offset markets, but reporting these removals in a corporate greenhouse gas inventory is still a nascent area. The governing bodies like GHG Protocol are still ironing out the guidance around ensuring traceability, credibility, and permanence. While many companies await further clarity on the guidance, it makes sense to start planning already. To demonstrate the potential impact at stake, we analyzed 4M+ hectares of spring wheat across the United States to understand how soil removals could affect corporate inventories.

How much abatement do soil removals actually account for?

Removals represent a large untapped opportunity for corporate reporting, but as with anything in agriculture, that opportunity varies based on geography. The chart below demonstrates how soil organic carbon (SOC) sequestration (soil removals) changed the total emissions intensity of spring wheat in four of the largest producing states in 2024.

The initial Field GHG Emission Factor shows the emissions intensity of spring wheat grown in that state, not including soil removals. The Net Emission Factor is the resulting emissions intensity after removals are included.

South Dakota actually generates a reduction greater than 100% from removals, reaching negative net emissions for spring wheat. At scale, this translates to meaningful impact. Take a company sourcing 100,000 tons of spring wheat from South Dakota. Without reporting removals, they are potentially missing out on 24,900 metric tons of CO2e abatement*. Assuming a typical annual Scope 3 reduction target of 500,000 tons/CO2e per year, that’s 5% of the annual total, just from removals from one crop in one state.

Other states, like Montana, demonstrate soil carbon loss (-0.0265), revealing significant opportunities to invest in regenerative practices that help sequester carbon. Let’s unpack why this discrepancy might exist. 

*Note: Every model that estimates abatement numbers carries a measure of uncertainty, and carbon stored in the soil could be released due to farming activities in the future, but understanding this potential unlocks huge opportunities for agriculture.

Why are some states sequestering more than others?

There are multiple reasons for the discrepancy between South Dakota and Montana’s soil sequestration. Weather patterns and soil types influence soil’s ability to store carbon, for example and those are largely out of our control. However, there were two main data points that emerged from our data that are controllable: tillage practices and crop rotation.

Tillage Practices

No-till farming is a method of growing crops without disturbing the soil through plowing. By keeping the soil intact, no-till farming helps reduce erosion, maintain soil structure, and keep carbon stored in the soil. On the other hand, conventional tillage practices (plowing) break up soil and release stored carbon in the atmosphere.

In South Dakota, with the highest SOC sequestration rate, over 92% of spring wheat farmers practice either reduced or no-till, with a large majority of those farmers choosing no-till. While Montana has some reduced tillage, there is still some form of tillage on 80%+ of its spring wheat fields. (It’s worth noting our data shows a sharp decline in no-till farming for spring wheat in Montana in 2022, which has not recovered. This may be related to the historic drought in the area).

While tillage is not the only factor, it’s certainly one reason why South Dakota produces carbon negative spring wheat.

‍Crop Rotation

Crop diversity is like a balanced diet for the soil. It increases the amount and variety of organic matter returned to the soil over time, which helps lock more carbon into the soil and improve soil health. Looking at spring wheat rotations in Montana and South Dakota, we see that Montana’s low diversity could contribute to its soil carbon loss.

In Montana, the dominant crop rotation is spring wheat paired with fallow land, representing more than 300,000 acres. Research from USDA has shown that a wheat-fallow rotation in Montana will lose soil organic carbon over time, regardless of whether it is tilled or no-till.¹  The next two common rotations in Montana include winter wheat or barley, closely related crops that limit diversity. The prevalence of these rotations suggests that incentivizing farmers to incorporate a more diverse crop rotation system (e.g. pulse crops like peas) could increase soil carbon sequestration.² On the other hand, diverse crop rotations are the norm in South Dakota.

In short, South Dakota is both increasing soil sequestration over the long term through a diverse crop rotation and keeping that soil carbon stored by implementing no-till at a very high rate. Montana, with its colder climate and shorter growing conditions, faces unique constraints on achieving more diverse rotations and, consequently, higher SOC sequestration.

How do soil removals impact your procurement and sustainability strategy?

In the coming years, soil removals will likely become a major component of most companies' sustainability strategies. The impact varies significantly by region: in South Dakota's spring wheat operations, removals are significant but not being claimed by most downstream buyers. In contrast, regions like Montana have the potential for removals by working with and supporting farmers to transition to more regenerative practices.

Many companies recognize this opportunity but are taking a measured approach while GHGP Land Sector Removals Guidance finalizes. Forward-thinking companies are already preparing for a future where measuring and reporting soil carbon becomes standard practice - building the data infrastructure and partnerships needed to capture this abatement accurately and report it compliantly. Companies that invest in these capabilities now will have a significant advantage when reporting standards are finalized, which is expected later this year.

This opportunity also raises a critical question of ensuring farmers are compensated long-term - not just to remove carbon, but to keep it stored through continued adoption of regenerative practices.

Curious what soil removals look like in your sourcing regions? Regrow's field-level emissions data helps teams from 40% of the largest food and agriculture companies map, analyze, report, and act on emissions in their supply chains. Get in touch today.

‍

Sources:

1. Montana Wheat and Barley Committee. Cover Crop Technical Note: Montana (May 2022)
2. Soil Science Society of America. “Growing Spring Peas to Increase Soil Organic Carbon in Eastern Montana” (Crops & Soils Magazine, August 2025)