Google has agreed to buy one million carbon credits from Indian climate-tech start-up Mitti Labs by 2030, in what the companies describe as the largest publicly announced deal linked to methane reductions in rice farming.
The four-year agreement will support projects across Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, covering about 100,000 hectares of rice-growing land at peak delivery, according to Xavier Laguarta, Mitti Labs’ co-founder. The financial terms have not been disclosed.
The scheme will pay farmers to reduce the amount of time their fields are continuously flooded. This limits the methane produced as rice is cultivated, while also reducing irrigation requirements.
Mitti Labs says the method can cut methane emissions by about half and water use by roughly 40 per cent without reducing yields. A majority of revenue from its projects is intended to go to farming communities, although the company has not said how much participating farmers will receive under the Google agreement.
Rice methane project to expand across India
The deal comes as Google tries to meet its target of reaching net zero emissions by 2030 while expanding the data centres and computing infrastructure required for artificial intelligence.
Google’s greenhouse gas emissions rose by 18 per cent in 2025 to about 14.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, according to its latest environmental report. The company has been looking for projects that can help address emissions beyond its direct operations.
Mitti Labs said Google spent about a year assessing the project, including examining its monitoring systems and visiting participating farms. The start-up uses satellite radar imagery and field measurements to track crop growth, soil moisture and flooding across smallholder farms.
Its GeoAI platform draws on imagery from commercial and public satellites, with resolutions ranging from 50 centimetres to 10 metres, alongside data gathered directly in the field. The company says its projects have saved more than 500 billion litres of water over the past two years.
“Having Google, one of the most sophisticated buyers in the market with rigorous due diligence processes, is obviously a good signal for us,” Mr Laguarta said.
The credits can be issued through Gold Standard or Isometric, two carbon-credit certification organisations, with independent third-party verification required before they are released.
Founded in 2023, Mitti Labs operates from New York and Bengaluru and currently works with more than 100,000 farmers. It also has customers including carbon marketplace Cool Effect, rice producer Ebro Foods and agricultural group Syngenta.
The Google agreement is the start-up’s largest purchase commitment so far and is expected to help it expand towards its ambition of working with millions of farmers by 2030. Mitti Labs plans to begin operations in the Philippines later this year, followed by Indonesia and other south-east Asian markets in 2027.
Google has previously backed carbon projects in India. In January 2025, it agreed to buy 100,000 tonnes of credits from Gurugram-based Varaha, in what was described as the company’s first large-scale carbon-removal purchase in the country and the biggest involving biomass-produced biochar.
