Carbon Standards today opened a 30-day public consultation on the Standard for Technically Advanced Kilns (TAK), developed by the Ithaka Institute. Designed for closed-flame, professional pyrolysis equipment operating at industrial scale, TAK Standard is the first biochar standard to monitor production digitally and in real time. It is scheduled to take effect worldwide on 30 December 2026.
Under existing biochar standards, a certificate rests on a single sample analyzed once a year and an annual audit visit; what happens in between is declared by the producer and trusted by the certifier. TAK is built differently. The pyrolysis reactor temperature, the flue-gas temperature and oxygen content, and the mass of biochar produced are measured continuously and transmitted online as they are recorded, and the carbon content is determined daily. The certifier does not reconstruct production after the fact - they follow it as it happens, and a batch is certified only for the periods for which a complete record exists.
Those data streams are cross-checked against one another, so the figures have to reconcile: the temperature record with the mass produced, the mass with the feedstock consumed, the carbon content with the temperature and feedstock. Where the continuous record is missing, that volume cannot be certified. Pyrolysis must run without fossil-fuel energy, pyrolysis gases must be oxidized rather than released, and carbon-monoxide and methane emissions are capped and continuously monitored.
“The carbon markets are eagerly awaiting the certainty and confidence that our new TAK standard provides - a first for the industry,” said Ueli Steiner, CEO of Carbon Standards. “Our standards create carbon credits with the highest quality. TAK goes even further by introducing real-time data monitoring. It thereby addresses the uncertainty in the markets as we invest in verifiable carbon assets and continue to be rigorous by design.”
The new TAK Standard certifies the production and quality of the biochar. The carbon sink it enables is quantified, monitored and registered under the Global Biochar C-Sink Standard. What TAK contributes is the integrity of the underlying data: mass, dry matter and carbon content are recorded as a closed chain of evidence, so each registered C-Sink rests on a verified batch record rather than on a single spot analysis.
“Over the past fifteen years we have shown how biochar carbon can be turned into durable carbon sinks and built the certification frameworks the industry works with. The TAK Standard goes one step further: it does not only set the rules, it verifies that they are met - in real time, batch by batch,” said Hans-Peter Schmidt of the Ithaka Institute, lead author of the standard.
Take part in the consultation
The draft standard (version 0.9) is open for public comment for 30 days, until 20 November 2026. A webinar presenting TAK and inviting feedback will be held on 11 November 2026 at 11h CET. After the consultation closes, Carbon Standards will publish the feedback together with structured responses before releasing the final standard. The consultation documents, comment form and webinar registration are available at https://www.carbon-standards.com/en/standards/tak/
