dMRV Wrapped: What We Learned Building MRV and Infrastructure for Leading Stakeholders

Every year, Spotify tells us what we listened to. This year, we thought we would share what we measured. Here is our dMRV Wrapped for 2025. 

These are a few things we learned from supporting projects across BECCS, DAC, biochar, biomass storage, and hybrid systems, and from working alongside leading registries, auditors, and developers preparing for credit issuance.

1. dMRV Has Become a Baseline Expectation

Over the past year, expectations around dMRV have become clearer. Registries, buyers, and financiers increasingly look for:

• Structured and well-documented data.
• Traceability from source data through calculations and claims.
• Systems that can be reviewed and understood by third parties.

For developers, this often means moving beyond ad hoc spreadsheets. For the broader ecosystem, it means MRV is becoming an operational capability rather than a reporting exercise.

2. MRV Looks Different Across Pathways – Alcove’s Modular Platform Streamlines All 

Each pathway brings its own MRV challenges.

• BECCS requires careful measurement of energy flows, counterfactuals, and permanence.
• DAC places emphasis on metering accuracy, redundancy, and energy-related emissions.
• Biochar relies heavily on mass balance, feedstock variability, and custody tracking.
• Biomass storage raises questions around decay assumptions, leakage, and long-term monitoring.
• mCDR introduces complexity around ocean transport, alkalinity or biomass fate, boundary setting, and long-duration monitoring in open systems.
• ERW depends on robust baselines, weathering rate assumptions, spatial variability, and long-term field monitoring.

What worked consistently across these pathways was a modular approach, clear variable definitions, and early alignment between operational data and methodology requirements.

3. Data Quality Depends on Context, Not Just Instrumentation

Sensors and automated data streams played an increasingly important role this year. At the same time, they were rarely sufficient on their own.

Reliable MRV required:

• Clear unit definitions and metadata.
• Calibration and quality control processes.
• Documentation explaining how data connects to reported outcomes.

Some of the most time-consuming issues were not technical failures, but missing context or assumptions that had not been written down. Strong data collection and governance proved just as important as measurement technology.

4. Audit Readiness Is a Continuous Process

Projects that moved smoothly through verification tended to integrate MRV early in their development.

They defined variables upfront, documented assumptions as they evolved, and treated MRV as part of ongoing operations. By the time verification began, most of the underlying work was already in place.

This reinforced a practical lesson we saw repeatedly throughout the year: audit readiness accumulates over time.

5. Digital Expectations Are Converging Across Registries

Methodologies still differ, but we observed growing alignment around digital expectations.

Across registries and emerging regulatory frameworks, there is increasing emphasis on transparency, reproducibility, and structured data submissions. This trend is shaping how projects design their MRV systems and how tools are evaluated.

As these expectations continue to converge, flexible and well-documented data systems become more valuable.

6. MRV Works Best When Treated as Infrastructure

The teams that benefited most from dMRV treated it as long-term infrastructure.They used MRV systems to support operations, internal decision-making, and external communication. This made it easier to respond to audits, buyer questions, and financing discussions, and helped position projects for future scale.

Looking Ahead

In the year ahead, we expect continued pressure for clearer assumptions, stronger data traceability, and systems that can adapt across registries and jurisdictions. Alcove is best positioned to help your team not just meet these expectations, but well surpass them.

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