The short version
Six things to know
What it is
45Z is a federal tax credit for producing low-carbon fuel. Part of that carbon footprint comes from how the corn was grown, so your practices can move it.
How long it runs
Projected to be a three-year program, starting with the 2026 crop — the 2026, 2027 and 2028 crops, paid out in 2028, 2029 and 2030.
How you'd get paid
Your corn gets a CI score from a USDA tool, measured in grams of CO2e per bushel — the same number the calculator shows you. Payment starts at a score of 4,928 g CO₂e/bu (CI 22.4) and is worth 10¢ per bushel, plus 2.5¢ for every full point (220 g) below that.
The money arrives as patronage, about two years after harvest:
- 2026 crop → patronage in August 2028, after Alto files their 2027 taxes
- 2027 crop → patronage in August 2029, after Alto files their 2028 taxes
- 2028 crop → patronage in August 2030, after Alto files their 2029 taxes
It is Tremont’s intention to pay this out in patronage at or near 100% cash.
Do not budget this against the crop year that earned it.
What it could be worth
Roughly $28 to $131 per acre, depending on your practices and yield. No-till with cover crops is the top of that range.
The catch
This is not guaranteed money, and it would not arrive until about two years after harvest. See the conditions below.
What to do now
Pre-enroll now — it costs nothing — then document your practices and keep your records. You cannot get paid for a practice you cannot prove you performed. Limited space; priority goes to 2026-crop enrollments and bushels delivered to Tremont locations at harvest.
Read this first
Payment is conditional
Nothing here is money you are owed. All four of these have to happen, or the payment is zero — for everyone:
- Alto has to qualify for the 45Z credit.
- Alto has to actually receive the credit money.
- The program has to reach an average score of 4,928 g CO₂e/bu (CI 22.4) or lower. This program is Tremont corn only, so Tremont’s average is Alto’s average — it is measured across all enrolled corn, not your individual field.
- Tremont Coop has to receive the funds before they can be paid out as patronage.
It costs nothing to enroll — and we need nearly everyone in.
There is no enrollment fee and no cost to sign up. Enrolling puts your acres in the pool and gets your practices on record.
Look again at condition 3. It is an average, and because this program is Tremont corn only, that average is entirely ours — nobody else’s acres count toward it, and nobody else’s can rescue it. A handful of strong fields cannot carry it alone. If most of our growers are enrolled and scoring well, the threshold is reachable. If only a few sign up, the average lands short and nobody gets paid — including the growers who did everything right on their own ground.
Whether Washington finalizes the rules and whether Alto claims the credit are out of our hands. The average is not. It is the one condition decided entirely by Tremont growers.
Pre-enroll nowThe 45Z credit is live, but the piece that lets farm practices count has not been finalized, and Treasury’s rules are still proposed. This page shows what your practices could be worth once that is in place, with a possibility that earlier crops qualify retroactively.
That is exactly why records matter now.
Common questions
Answers, straight up
Start here. The detailed tables and tools are further down.
How much could I actually get?
It depends on your practices and your yield. At 225 bushels in Tazewell County:
| Practice | Per acre |
|---|
Assumes 180 lbs N with an inhibitor on 70%. On 500 acres, no-till with cover crops would be roughly $56,000 a year.
What does it cost to enroll?
Nothing. There is no enrollment fee and no cost to sign up.
What enrolling does is put your acres in the pool and get your practices on record, so you are ready the day the federal rules are finalized. If the credit never materializes, you are out nothing but the paperwork. Space is limited — priority goes to producers who enroll for the 2026 crop and to bushels delivered to Tremont Co-op locations during harvest.
Why does it matter whether my neighbors enroll?
Because the threshold is an average, not an individual test. The program has to reach the 4,928 g CO₂e/bu (CI 22.4) threshold across all enrolled corn — and this program is Tremont corn only, so that average is made up entirely of our growers.
That means a small number of strong fields cannot carry it. If most of our growers are enrolled and scoring well, the threshold is reachable. If only a few sign up, the average lands short and nobody gets paid — including the growers who did everything right on their own ground.
Whether the federal rules get finalized and whether Alto claims the credit are out of our hands. Participation is the one condition that is genuinely up to us.
When would the money actually show up?
About two years after harvest, as patronage. The credit has to run through Alto’s tax filing before any of it can move.
The money arrives as patronage, about two years after harvest:
- 2026 crop → patronage in August 2028, after Alto files their 2027 taxes
- 2027 crop → patronage in August 2029, after Alto files their 2028 taxes
- 2028 crop → patronage in August 2030, after Alto files their 2029 taxes
It is Tremont’s intention to pay this out in patronage at or near 100% cash.
Do not budget this against the crop year that earned it.
Why might I get nothing even with a good score?
Because three of the four conditions happen outside your field. Alto has to qualify for the credit, actually receive it, and the program has to reach an average score of 4,928 g CO₂e/bu (CI 22.4) or lower. Then Tremont has to receive the funds.
That third one is the one growers miss. The average is across all the corn in the program — and since this program is Tremont corn only, Tremont’s average is Alto’s average. You could score 2,500 on every acre you farm and still receive nothing if the rest of the enrolled corn does not get the average under 4,928.
What is a "CI score," and where does mine come from?
CI stands for carbon intensity — the greenhouse gas footprint of your corn. USDA built a tool called the Feedstock Carbon Intensity Calculator (FD-CIC) that scores corn using your county, your yield, your nitrogen rate, and your practices. Your county matters — soil and climate differ, so the same practices score differently across Illinois.
Lower is better, and every score is in g CO₂e per bushel. Conventional corn is assigned 6,028 (CI 27.4). Payment starts at 4,928 (CI 22.4). No-till with cover crops can get near 1,000.
My corn is grown well. Why would conventional pay $0?
Because a field with no qualifying practice is assigned the national default score of 6,028 g CO₂e/bu (CI 27.4) — it does not get scored on its own merits.
This costs central Illinois growers more than most. Our yields are high enough that a conventional field’s real score would already beat the national default. You cannot claim that head start without a documented qualifying practice.
Adopt one practice and the field flips to its actual field-level score. That is why the first practice jumps so sharply from zero — you are unlocking the advantage your yields already earned you.
Does my strip-till count as no-till?
Yes — most strip-till systems qualify as no-till. USDA classifies tillage with a tool called T-DISC, which scores how much soil you actually disturbed — and a strip-till planter pass scores far below the no-till line. The one thing to watch is a deep strip-till fertilizer pass:
- Strip-till at 16 inches or shallower → rates as no-till
- Strip-till at 18 inches → drops to reduced till
- A strip freshener pass → also drops you to reduced till
The break point is just over 16 inches. Paired with cover crops at 225 bushels, no-till versus reduced till is about $73/acre versus $62/acre — so if you run a deep bar, know your actual working depth. You can check your own implement below.
Why does my yield change my score?
USDA does not score your nitrogen rate by itself. It scores nitrogen use intensity — pounds of N per bushel produced. The national benchmark is 0.98 lbs N per bushel.
At 180 lbs of nitrogen:
- 180 bu → 1.00 lbs N/bu — just over the line
- 200 bu → 0.90 lbs N/bu — under
- 250 bu → 0.72 lbs N/bu — well under
So cutting nitrogen and raising yield count the same way. Trimming 20 lbs of N earns the same kind of credit as adding 20 bushels.
Is a nitrogen inhibitor by itself enough to get paid?
Usually not. On its own, an inhibitor only clears the threshold at high yields — around 250 bushels with 180 lbs of N. At 200 or 225 bushels it falls short and pays nothing.
Reduced till alone has the same problem: nothing at 200 bushels, about $28/acre at 225.
Cover crops and no-till clear the threshold at any yield. If you want a payment you can count on, that is where it comes from. An inhibitor stacked on top of those is worth real money.
Do practices stack?
Yes, and stacking pays more than the parts added together. At 225 bushels: cover crops alone and no-till alone are each about $62/acre. Put them together and it is about $113 — well beyond either one on its own.
Soil carbon is the reason. The practices that build organic matter earn a credit that does not shrink as your yield climbs, which is also why the strong stacks qualify at every yield.
What records do I need to keep?
Field by field, for every acre you want scored:
- Tillage passes — implement, working depth, and date
- Cover crops — species, seeding date, termination date
- Nitrogen — rate, product, timing, and how much got an inhibitor
- Yield — actual bushels per acre, plus your crop insurance yields / APH and corn moisture, so yield can be adjusted to the 15.5% standard
Working depth is the one growers forget, and it is the one that decides whether strip-till counts as no-till. Write it down.
Can the 2026 crop still qualify?
Possibly. The federal rules are not final, and there is a chance that crops grown before the rules land can be claimed retroactively.
Nobody can promise that. But it costs nothing to keep good records now, and it is the only way to be ready if retroactive claims are allowed.
Am I locked into anything by reading this?
No. This page is informational. It is not an offer, not a contract, and not a guarantee of payment. The rates shown are program terms under discussion and can change before anything is signed.
Any actual enrollment would be a separate written agreement.
Who verifies my score?
The verification process is still being finalized, along with the federal rules it has to satisfy. Expect third-party verification of your records against your reported practices.
Talk to Tremont before you assume a particular system will qualify.
What about my landlord?
You enroll them automatically. When a producer enrolls, the landlords on that ground are enrolled with it — there is no separate signup for a landowner.
Questions on a specific farm? Talk to Mike Hainline or Joe Logsdon at 309-925-4981.
What if I apply manure?
The USDA tool handles manure, but every figure on this page assumes none was applied. Manure changes both your nitrogen accounting and your score, sometimes substantially.
If you run manure, talk to us — your numbers need to be run separately.
Detail & tools
Run your own numbers
For growers who want the full picture.
Full calculatorSet nitrogen, inhibitor share and acres
Scores come from 18,480 actual runs of the USDA FD-CIC covering every Illinois county — not estimates. Currently showing Tazewell County.
Is my tillage no-till?T-DISC checker — most strip-till rates as no-till
USDA scores every tillage pass as mixing efficiency × depth ÷ 30. Your rating is the highest single window in the year, so one aggressive fall pass sets your whole classification.
| Rating | Classified as |
|---|---|
| 0.000 – 0.075 | No-till |
| 0.076 – 0.252 | Reduced till |
| 0.253 – 1.000 | Conventional |
Reference: common implements
| Implement | Mixing | Depth | Index | Class |
|---|
The full pay scaleEvery score, and what it pays
$/bushel = $0.10 + $0.025 × each full point below a score of 4,928 g CO₂e/bu (CI 22.4) (one point = 220 g CO2e/bu)
Only whole points count — nothing is rounded up. A score of 4,820 pays the same as 4,928; the next 2.5¢ arrives at 4,708. The CI figure in parentheses is the same score in fuel units (g/bu ÷ 220).
| Score (g CO₂e/bu) | (CI) | $/bu | $/ac @200 | $/ac @225 | $/ac @250 |
|---|
Payment by practice and yieldReal FD-CIC scores at three yields
180 lbs N, inhibitor on 70%, Tazewell County. The model is re-run at each yield, so these are not scaled estimates.
| Practice | @200 bu | @225 bu | @250 bu |
|---|
Where these numbers come fromUSDA sources and independent peer review
The tool. Scores come from the USDA Feedstock Carbon Intensity Calculator (FD-CIC), Version 1.1.1, run for corn with no manure applied. We ran the workbook 18,480 times across six practice systems, seven yields (150–300 bu), eight nitrogen rates (100–240 lbs), five inhibitor levels and every distinct scoring zone in Illinois. FD-CIC returns identical results for counties sharing a zone, so all 102 Illinois counties are covered exactly. The calculator interpolates between those runs; the tables report them directly.
Peer review. USDA put FD-CIC through independent expert review (June 2026). Six reviewers with no prior involvement in the tool and no conflicts of interest, including Dr. Charles Rice (co-awarded the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his IPCC work) and Dr. Keith Paustian (a lead developer of the DayCent model FD-CIC is built on). Reviewers found the methodology scientifically sound but complex.
They also flagged real limitations: soil carbon calibration around saturation and modeling depth, using winter rye alone to represent cover crops, assumptions about intermittent tillage and manure, and geographic resolution at the MLRA level being coarse. USDA responded to each in the published report.
Nitrogen normalization. The national average assumes 155.7 lbs N/acre at 186 bu/acre — 0.84 lbs N per bushel. USDA judged that an underestimate and set the operative benchmark at 0.98 lbs N per bushel, applying a normalization factor of about 0.86 so a grower sitting exactly at 0.98 receives the default emissions rather than a bonus or a penalty.
Source documents: USDA FD-CIC Ver 1.1.1 (usda.gov/usda-fdcic); FD-CIC Methods Document, August 2026; FD-CIC Peer Review Report, June 2026; USDA T-DISC Ver 1.0. Tremont holds copies of all four — ask and we will send them.
The fine print
Disclaimers
This page is informational and illustrative. It is not an offer, a contract, or a guarantee of payment.
Payment depends on Alto qualifying for the 45Z credit and receiving it. If Alto does not qualify, or does not receive the credit, there is no payment.
Payment depends on the program reaching an average score of 4,928 g CO₂e/bu (CI 22.4) or lower. This program covers Tremont corn only, so Tremont’s average is Alto’s average. It is measured across all corn in the program, not your individual field — a strong score on your own acres does not guarantee you a payment.
Payment depends on Tremont Coop receiving the funds from Alto. Tremont cannot distribute money it has not received.
Payment would be made as patronage, roughly two years after harvest, following Alto’s tax filing.
The rate structure is illustrative. The 10¢ first point and 2.5¢ per full point shown here are program terms under discussion and may change before any agreement is executed.
The federal rules are not final. Treasury’s 45Z regulations are proposed, and USDA FD-CIC has not been integrated into the 45ZCF-GREET model that governs claims. Practice-based credits cannot currently be claimed.
Your actual score will differ. The figures here use county-level defaults with no manure. Your real score depends on your fields, your records, and verification.
Figures update to the county you select. If you farm across county lines, each field is scored on the county it sits in.
This is not tax, legal, or financial advice. Talk to your own advisor before making planting, input, or equipment decisions based on anything here.