Borehole and safe-water projects can generate carbon credits when reliable access to safe drinking water reduces the need for households to boil water with firewood or charcoal. The calculation is not just a count of boreholes installed. It is a test of sustained use, baseline behaviour and the amount of non-renewable fuel genuinely avoided.
The core calculation
The first-pass model estimates the litres of safe water used by participating households, applies the share that would otherwise have been boiled, converts avoided boiling into wood savings, then applies fNRB, uptime and deductions.
- Households served defines project reach.
- Baseline boiling share estimates how much safe water displaces boiling.
- Wood displaced per litre links water access to fuel savings.
- fNRB limits crediting to the non-renewable share of biomass.
- Uptime and deductions account for downtime, leakage and uncertainty.
Try the borehole project calculator
Use the live demo below to test how household reach, uptime and baseline boiling assumptions affect annual credit volume:
When the estimate is useful
The calculator is useful for screening whether a borehole project is worth deeper work. It helps you see if the likely annual credit volume is commercially meaningful, whether verification costs could be absorbed, and which assumptions need field evidence before anyone relies on the numbers externally.
What to do next
If the estimate looks promising, use the Methodology Selector to check safe-water methodology fit, then use the Verification Cost Estimator to test whether the project can carry validation and monitoring costs.