Google and Mitti Labs rice methane deal: 1M carbon credits, 3M metric tons CO2e over 20 years

Google signed a four-year deal with Mitti Labs to fund methane reductions from rice farming in India, aiming to generate 1 million carbon credits by 2030. The project uses alternate wetting and drying, which cuts methane emissions by about half and irrigation water by 40%, without reducing yields, according to the companies. The expected warming impact avoided is 3 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent over 20 years, or 1 million metric tons over 100 years. The credits will come from smallholder farmers on plots under 10 hectares. Mitti Labs says it uses a geospatial AI platform, developed with NASA, to track soil moisture, crop health, and flooding at the individual farm level. The company plans to expand to over 100,000 hectares by 2030. For Google, this is part of a wider push into clean power and carbon deals, including geothermal, solar, storage, and a virtual power plant announced this month. Methane from rice cultivation accounts for roughly 10-12% of global methane emissions each year, per an IPCC reference. The deal highlights a growing market for methane-based carbon credits, but verification and permanence questions remain, especially around how Google accounts for these credits against its own emissions.