Paying for biochar

Part four of a series on biochar for orchard and vineyard growers

Part three looked at the biomass produced in almond orchards from annual maintenance and pruning, plus the high volume created from orchard removal. Part three also examined the early research on what biochar can do in orchard soils. That leaves a practical question: what does biochar cost, and does it make sense for growers in California's orchards and vineyards to start using it?

Cost and application rate

Biochar prices vary widely depending on feedstock, production method, and supplier. For that reason, the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) declined to set a flat payment rate when it added biochar to the Healthy Soils Program, and instead set support at up to $250 per ton.

Application rate drives the per-acre cost as much as the price per ton does. The Madera almond trial applied biochar at rates from 1 to 10 tons per acre, with one ton reported as the lowest effective rate. Moving from the bottom of that range to the top adds up quickly: that's ten times as much biochar for every acre.

What's covered

Until this year, California's main soil health incentive did not cover biochar. In 2021, CDFA said it could not pay for biochar applications through the Healthy Soils Program because there was not enough published data to set application rates or estimate greenhouse gas reductions. Biochar was eligible only through demonstration projects.

The 2026 guidelines change that. Biochar is now an eligible category, and orchards and vineyards qualify. Growers can apply 1 to 6 tons per acre, spread over one to three years.

Qualifying takes some groundwork. Each project needs a plan written by a technical assistance provider trained through the American Biochar Institute (formerly the U.S. Biochar Initiative). The field has to rate good or excellent for biochar response in the USDA Web Soil Survey, though a provider can submit newer soil data if that rating is out of date. Funding comes from a regional block grant recipient, not from CDFA directly, and not all of them will offer biochar.

At the federal level, NRCS standard 336, Soil Carbon Amendment, covers biochar through EQIP and the Conservation Stewardship Program. Payment rates are set state by state and updated each fall, and the scenarios are priced by the percentage of biochar in a biochar and compost blend. A district conservationist can confirm what applies to a specific project.

Where the support falls short

The Healthy Soils definition covers only biochar produced off-site. Biochar producers asked CDFA during public comment to allow on-site production. The agency responded that it did not have the capacity to develop rules for on-site biochar during this funding cycle. For an orchard hoping to convert its own wood at replant, the most direct route is not yet eligible. The incentive contrast is sharp next to Whole Orchard Recycling, a separate Healthy Soils practice that pays a flat $861.42 per acre to chip orchard trees and incorporate them back into the same orchard soil. 

Orchard wood does reach biochar producers. A quarter of the producers in the American Biochar Institute's 2025 U.S. market survey listed orchards as a feedstock source. Under the current rules, though, Healthy Soils support means buying the char back, and hauling is not cheap. Producers in the same survey named transportation costs as an obstacle to wider use.

The 6-ton cap also sets a ceiling on what the program will support. A grower applying at the low end of the Madera range stays well under it. At the 10-ton end, or at the rate used in the Oasis vineyard trial, a grower would be paying for the difference. CDFA said it may revisit the rate after reviewing the first round of projects, including their costs and benefits. What the first round of growers report will shape whether the cap moves.

Carbon markets are already shaping what growers pay. Credit revenue lets producers sell biochar for less than it costs to make, and in the American Biochar Institute's 2025 survey, only 6% of U.S. production came from operations earning nothing from credits.

The credit itself generally goes to whoever runs the pyrolysis (the process of making biochar by breaking down organic materials using high heat in the complete absence of oxygen). Pacific Biochar, which supplied the Oasis trial, sells carbon removal credits alongside the biochar. For a grower, the value should show up in the quote for the biochar. It's worth asking a supplier how their pricing reflects the carbon credits they sell.

What the research has yet to show

How long does biochar take to pay for itself? For California orchards and vineyards, that number does not exist yet. The trials that can answer that question are still running.

Early signs from those trials are encouraging. At an October field day in 2025 at the Madera site, UC Merced agroecologist Rebecca Ryals reported that soil health benefits including water infiltration were starting to appear, and that the small test plots were out-yielding the controls.

California's biochar demonstration work is thin. Both biochar projects CDFA funded in 2021 went to orchards: the Madera almond trial, and an olive orchard in Yolo County run by the Center for Land-Based Learning with UC Davis. American Farmland Trust is analyzing the economics of the Madera project, which is where an economic answer would come from. Two orchards is a narrow base for the state's perennial acreage. The block grants won't widen it, since CDFA has said research does not fit their timeline and is not a stated purpose of the Climate Bond funding behind them. Perennial crop research will need its own funding.

Filling the gap

Oakville Bluegrass Cooperative is seeking funding to design an alternative: a network of feedstock suppliers, pyrolysis equipment, and biochar buyers, run by the Cooperative. We envision a model where the carbon revenue and biochar sales return to the growers supplying the wood. The deliverable is a network design with financial projections and a risk assessment, which is the kind of groundwork neither the block grants nor the demonstration projects currently cover. 

Would your operation benefit from a biochar trial? Let’s see what we can build together!