Mast Reforestation Completes Innovative Post-fire Carbon Removal Project with Biomass Burial (BiCRS) in Montana

Burial Of 10 Million Pounds Of Fire-Killed Trees Completes Largest Single Biomass Storage Project To Reach VCM Within Year Of Launch, Generating Thousands Of Puro.earth v2025 Credits By Q1 2026

SEATTLE, Sept. 9, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Mast Reforestation today announced the completion of biomass burial at its Mast Wood Preserve MT1 project in south central Montana. Just four months after breaking ground, Mast has successfully filled, capped, and begun continuous monitoring for unanticipated greenhouse gas emissions as part of the MRV (monitoring, reporting, and third party verification) process. This is the first project to combine engineered carbon removal through burned biomass burial with post-wildfire reforestation.

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With MT1's expected issuance volume, robust MRV, and BeZero Carbon rating of 'A'pre, Mast has established itself as an operational world leader in Terrestrial Storage of Biomass (TSB). Biomass burial captures the remaining carbon in fire-killed logs, making it one of the most efficient biomass-based CDR pathways available today. This project is an exciting proof point for advanced and durable CDR market offerings that can rapidly scale at an attractive price per tonne. This methodology sits adjacent to biochar, which Supercritical recently reported as 89% sold out for v2025 and 40% pre-sold for v2026. Biomass burial shares many characteristics with biochar, but sequesters up to twice as much carbon from the source biomass.1

Mast is advancing TSB with leading partners across engineering and science, building operational excellence that can scale globally. The project is registered with Puro.earth, with up to 5,000 tonnes of durable vintage 2025 carbon removal credits expected for issuance by Q1 2026. Credit volume and integrity is verified through rigorous wood composition analysis, thorough weight records and MRV that raises the bar for assurance. MRV results to-date demonstrate that the chamber is functioning as designed, with no greenhouse gas emissions occurring within the chamber. Long term monitoring is funded through an independent endowment, exceeding industry standards to ensure long term durability.

More than 10 million pounds of unmerchantable, fire-killed trees have been buried. These logs were destined for pile burning as the landowner was working to clear the land of hazardous conditions and future wildfire fuel. The MT1 project has removed this carbon from the atmospheric cycle, placing it within a permanent chamber engineered to prevent decomposition for at least the next century.

MT1 carbon credits uniquely finance reforestation on the same landscape. The new value that these fire-killed trees hold when buried for their carbon, both mitigates ecological concerns above ground and makes way for resilient recovery. The land around MT1 is rich in biodiversity, including threatened resident and migratory species, and cultural heritage sites. Project revenue and restoration enables the landowners to continue to steward the land for both long-term forest growth and silvopasture as their family has for generations. Mast, via its two commercial nurseries Silvaseed and Cal Forest Nurseries, is currently growing the first batch of seedlings sown from wild seed gathered near MT1 for planting in the spring of 2026.

"MT1 delivers what buyers are looking for: durable carbon removal with the strong co-benefits of reforestation, and huge potential to scale, quickly," said Grant Canary, CEO of Mast. "Wildfires today are not the fires of even a decade ago, outpacing traditional means of recovery and vast funding shortages. MT1 demonstrates a path to accelerate post-fire reforestation in areas of large-scale devastation, support local livelihoods and ecological recovery, with credits that can be generated and retired within a year. MT1 opens the door to scale this well beyond Montana."

According to CDR.fyi, MT1 is on track to be one of the largest deliveries of vintage 2025 TSB removal credits on the market.

Mast's expansion of post-fire biomass burial is well underway with additional projects in review. Mast analysis indicates more than 2.8 million tons of fire-killed trees across Montana's recently burned landscapes alone. Carbon sale revenue creates one of the only viable pathways for funding reforestation in these areas, where high-severity fires have destroyed seed sources, government or philanthropic dollars are insufficient, and mills that accept burned trees are limited; exacerbated by mill closures in the state.

MT1 credits are listed for pre-sale on CEEZER and Cloverly, offering buyers early access to one of the market's most transparent and durable CDR solutions. MT1 received a rating of 'Apre' with low project execution risk, securing MT1 among the top 8% of non-nature-based projects globally compared to BeZero's ex-post ratings.

"Rapid iteration was ingrained in our process," stated Lisa Gonzalez-Kramer, VP, Carbon Development at Mast. "Early feedback from our engineering partners and third parties pushed Mast's R&D and complemented the experience on our team, resulting in a project where everything worked as we hoped."

Follow Mast on LinkedIn to see our biomass burial work from start to finish.

About Mast

As intensifying wildfires destroy more forestland every year, Mast Reforestation is scaling post-wildfire reforestation in North America. Mast pioneered restorative carbon removal with durable biomass burial to remove carbon from the atmospheric cycle and finance resilient recovery. Mast owns and operates two of the largest commercial wild tree seed and seedling nurseries in the West, 150-year-old Silvaseed and Cal Forest, two crucial hubs in the U.S. forestry supply chain. Mast grows the majority of seedlings for California and manages the majority of seed for landowners across the 11 western states. Since its founding, Mast has restored thousands of acres across California, Montana, and Oregon. Producing an average of 36 million seedlings annually, Mast continues to cultivate and protect the biological legacy of Western conifer forests for future generations.

Media Contact For interviews and project footage: [email protected]

1 - https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlehtml/2022/ee/d2ee01021f As much as 50% or more of the carbon contained in source biomass is lost during pyrolysis for biochar production.

SOURCE Mast Reforestation