Carbon Credits for Organic Waste: How Australia's ACCU Scheme Is Evolving for Anaerobic Digestion
Every year, Australia sends millions of tonnes of organic material to landfill — and as it breaks down, it releases methane, a greenhouse gas far more potent than carbon dioxide over the near term. The Australian Government's carbon crediting framework is steadily catching up with the technologies that can prevent this. Here's where the Australian Carbon Credit Unit (ACCU) scheme stands today, why it matters for anaerobic digestion, and how AWE's work in regional Australia fits the bigger picture.
## The methane problem hiding in regional landfills
Australia generated about 48 million tonnes of organic waste in 2021–22, according to the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water (DCCEEW). When food, garden and agricultural organics decompose without oxygen in landfill, they produce methane. DCCEEW estimates organic waste in Australian landfills generates around 13 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions each year, and methane accounts for roughly 97% of all emissions from the country's solid waste sector.
The harder problem is that most of this methane is never captured. Nationally, only about 42% of the landfill gas Australia generates is collected (DCCEEW, drawing on UNFCCC data), and that capture is concentrated at large metropolitan sites. Smaller regional landfills — many of them effectively unmanaged for gas — simply vent methane to the atmosphere. For the regional food and agricultural communities AWE works with, that is both an environmental cost and a rising financial one, as state landfill levies climb year on year.
## What ACCUs are — and what already exists for waste
An Australian Carbon Credit Unit represents one tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent avoided or removed, issued and administered by the Clean Energy Regulator. Contrary to a common assumption, anaerobic digestion and organic waste are not new to the scheme. The Alternative Waste Treatment (AWT) method has already issued about 5.57 million ACCUs — roughly 3% of the more than 180 million units issued since the scheme began in 2012. A separate Source Separated Organic Waste method is on the books, though it is scheduled to expire on 31 March 2026. And the 2025 Landfill Gas method already credits operators not just for flaring captured gas or generating electricity from it, but for upgrading it into biomethane as a natural gas substitute (DCCEEW). The principle that diverting and treating organic waste deserves carbon credits is, in short, well established.
## The methodology that's about to improve
In early 2026, DCCEEW confirmed it had prioritised developing a remade Alternative Waste Treatment method — the first to progress under the proponent-led method development process the government opened in 2024, with the Australian Resources Recovery Council leading the work (as reported by Argus). Two changes matter most: the remade method is expected to add biomethane generation as an eligible activity, and to offer a longer crediting period more in line with the period available to landfill gas projects. That reflects a fairness argument industry has been making for some time — that resource recovery through anaerobic digestion, which diverts waste rather than managing it after the fact, should be credited at least as generously as capturing gas from a landfill it could have avoided. Aligning the rules removes a quiet disincentive against the better environmental outcome.
## Why the timing works for Australia
This is happening alongside broader momentum. ACCUs traded around A$40 per tonne in early 2026, driven by demand under the Safeguard Mechanism (Clean Energy Regulator and market reporting). While the EY Net Zero Centre's 2026 outlook expects prices to hold in the A$30–35 range to 2028, it projects a gradual climb toward roughly A$70 by 2035. Combined with the national goal of an 80% resource recovery rate across all waste streams by 2030 (National Waste Policy Action Plan), the direction of policy is clear: keep organics out of landfill, and recognise the operators who make that happen.
## Where AWE fits
AWE Technology Solutions develops anaerobic digestion projects that take organic waste from regional food and agricultural industries and turn it into renewable biomethane, food-grade biogenic CO₂ and certified organic fertiliser — locally, before that waste ever reaches a landfill. The methane that would otherwise escape a regional tip is instead captured and put to use. As Australia's carbon crediting rules evolve to better recognise anaerobic digestion, they reinforce a model AWE is already built around: turning a regional waste problem into local energy, local products and lower emissions, and supporting the communities that generate the feedstock in the first place.
We track these developments closely on behalf of our project partners and the regional communities we work with. To talk through what the changing regulatory landscape means for organic waste in your area, get in touch.