The government-backed European Carbon Market is coming – and it builds on the carefully designed EU system for companies to set and report climate targets. For companies and carbon project developers in Europe, this is the safe and promising way forward in a time when GHG protocol rules for forests are unknown.
Now is the time for identifying what measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV) solutions will support participating in this market that will meet anticipated European reporting standards.
The Full Lands Integration Tool (FLINT) is the perfect fit for companies that need to report and account for GHG emissions and removals in forests and nature in their supply chain. If you’re a furniture maker, a DIY chain, or a construction company, this tool is for you! FLINT meets all the highest EU standards and comes with an open source community to help you figure out your forest’s GHG footprint.
What is the EU Carbon Market and Why is FLINT A Solution?
The European Union just adopted a series of methodologies for certification of carbon removals, including for the planting of trees. In May 2026, the Forest Management methodologies will be published. These methodologies define the reporting rules and the quality criteria for what carbon models you can use to meet compliance requirements.
Moja global’sFLINT platform incorporates a carbon model that has decades of scientific research, testing, and application behind it, and is used by several governments to document meeting Paris Agreement targets. The model estimates and reports on all greenhouse gases relevant in the LULUCF sector (CO2, CO, CH4, and N2O). And it meets the EU modelling criteria as we show below.
Criteria for reporting models that the European Commission considers compliant
- Transparency and traceability, that is to say, the attributes of the model shall be well described, the model version shall be clearly indicated, and changes between versions shall be traceable and well documented.
FLINT’s core scientific model and supporting data pre- and post-processing code are all open-source, transparent, and well-documented. All input parameters are under user control. The impacts on estimated carbon stocks and fluxes resulting from changes in model version or input data can be clearly documented by repeated model runs.
- Scientific credibility, that is to say, the model shall have been shown in peer-reviewed scientific studies to estimate carbon stock changes and/or GHG emissions for soil/crop management, fertiliser management, rewetting and restoration of peatlands and of other organic soils, or agroforestry/afforestation under comparable pedo-climatic conditions and for the plant functional types or vegetation characteristics that are relevant to the activity.
The scientific core model of the FLINT application for forests, forest management, and land-use changes (afforestation and deforestation) has been widely applied and tested in many countries of the world, including in 28 EU states. Other scientific models can also be implemented in the FLINT, and several non-CO2 models are already available. Where there is a gap, this can easily be filled by the user or the community. For example, a peatland module developed for Canada already exists and could be tested for use in the EU. Other FLINT applications have applied a variety of crop and soil models in Kenya and Australia.
- Suitability, that is to say, the model shall have been calibrated and validated based on direct measurements from datasets that accurately represent the pedoclimatic region where the activity takes place, while the calibration and validation data shall be independent, either by using two separate datasets with no overlap of research locations, or by employing a statistical process such as cross-validation.
The core scientific model in the FLINT toolbox has been calibrated and validated in regional and national-scale applications, including in 28 EU states and the results have been published. Future applications of the tool in other geographic regions may require additional calibration and validation efforts. If the model has not been applied in your area, then you can bring your own data to the system.
- Minimum accuracy, that is to say, when tested against the validation dataset, the mean bias of the model shall be smaller than or equal to an estimate of pooled measurement uncertainty (PMU), at least 90 % of the observed values shall fall within the model’s 90% prediction intervals, and the amount of variance explained by the model shall be greater than zero.
The minimum accuracy of the FLINT in new applications will have to be determined using region-specific observed values. Using data assimilation techniques, model parameters can be further improved if minimum accuracies in new geographic regions cannot be met.
The draft guidelines also state that “The minimum resolution of land cover and volume of above-ground biomass shall be 10 m”. The FLINT operates at user-specified grid sizes, and 10 x 10 m spatial resolution can be achieved wherever the appropriate forest inventory data are available or can be specified at that scale.
Meeting the EU Carbon Market opportunity with FLINT
So, if you use FLINT, you can meet the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive on reporting needs and start EU carbon credit development with rigor and a solid scientific basis.
If you’re interested in learning more join our Demo Town Halls on March 11 or March 25, and hear IPCC GHG Guidelines author and retired Senior Research Scientist Werner Kurz and EU CRC Expert Group Member Asger Strange Olesen explain just how solid FLINT is and why it is your model for the future.