#Carbon credit

[ireton]

CHRIS SKY - The CARBON CREDIT SCAM

[kazifatagar]

Selangor to Implement Carbon Credit Pilot Projects

The Selangor government is developing a carbon market policy, says Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Amirudin Shari. The Standing Committee on Environment, Climate Change and Green Technology is assessing greenhouse gas emissions to create strategic guidelines. Selangor to Implement Carbon Credit Pilot Projects Collaborating with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability and…

[nepalenergyforum]

COP-29: Nepal to Host High-Level Meeting on ‘Addressing Climate-Related Loss and Damage in Mountainous Regions

Kathmandu, Nov 5: As the stage is all set in Azerbaijan for the annual world climate conference, COP29, Nepal has finalized its agenda to be raised in the event. President Ram Chandra Paudel is scheduled to attend the UN climate conference being held in Baku, capital city of Azerbaijan, from November 11 to 22. Chief of climate change division at Ministry of Forest and Environment, Dr Sindhu…

[earthoodservices]

The Role of Carbon Credits in Achieving ESG Goals: A Pathway to Sustainability.

Carbon Credits have emerged as a crucial mechanism for organizations with ESG goals. As businesses include sustainability in their core strategies, carbon credits offer a tangible way of offsetting emissions, reducing carbon footprints, and demonstrating environmental accountability. The article looks at how carbon credits can contribute to ESG aims and thereby drive sustainable growth.

Carbon Credits as an ESG Tool

Carbon credits showcase verified reductions in GHG or greenhouse gas emissions and are a vital component of corporate decarbonization strategies. Through buying carbon credits, organizations can offset emissions that are hard to eliminate directly, leading to progress toward net-zero targets. The process aligns with the ‘E’ of “Environmental” in ESG, ensuring companies actively manage and reduce their carbon footprint. 

Carbon credits are especially valuable in sectors having ‘hard-to-abate’ emissions such as manufacturing, logistics, and aviation, where immediate decarbonization is not always feasible. For these industries, using credits for offsetting emissions is a practical way to comply with regulatory frameworks as well as fulfill climate-based commitments.

Improving Transparency in ESG Reporting

Transparent reporting of carbon credit use is crucial for maintaining ESG integrity. Emerging standards like the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) in Europe and guidelines from the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) demand more detailed disclosures regarding carbon credits, including project details, verification standards, and their impact on emission reductions. This transparency boosts investor confidence and aligns corporate strategies with global climate objectives.

The disclosure of credit purchases and their associated impacts, allows companies to avoid accusations of greenwashing and demonstrate accountability. It is a crucial aspect due to the increasing global scrutiny of ESG claims.

Supporting Broader Sustainability Goals

Carbon credits go beyond emission reductions, by funding projects that have additional environmental and social benefits.

Conservation and Reforestation: Many Carbon Credits support reforestation, which not only helps sequester carbon but also improves biodiversity and promotes sustainable land usage.

Community development: Projects can have a positive impact on the local community, generating socio-economic benefits such as jobs, better infrastructure, and improved access to clean drinking water.

Projects for Renewable Energy: Investments made in wind, solar, and hydroelectric projects help reduce emissions, support the energy transition, and are a key element of global efforts to achieve sustainable development.

These co-benefits align with the broader ESG goals, demonstrating that carbon credits can be leveraged not only for environmental impact but also for social and governance outcomes.

Promoting Sustainable Finance

The growing use of carbon credits is linked to sustainable finance, as investors increasingly seek companies with strong ESG credentials. Companies that actively manage emissions and invest in verified carbon offset projects can attract more ESG-focused capital. This has led to innovations like green bonds tied to carbon offset projects and internal carbon pricing models that integrate emissions costs into investment decisions​.

Challenges and Opportunities

Carbon credits provide a way to achieve ESG goals. However, they come with a few challenges.

Quality Assurance- It is important to ensure the integrity of carbon credits, and high-quality credits are verified by credible standards such as Verra or the Gold Standard.

Compliance with Regulations- As regulations change, companies must adapt quickly to meet new reporting standards and credit quality requirements.

Price volatility- Prices for carbon credits can fluctuate and impact the predictability of ESG strategies that rely on offsets.

These challenges, however, also present an opportunity to innovate and improve ESG performances, and new initiatives such as the Core Carbon Principles, developed by the “Integrity Council for Voluntary Carbon Markets”, can enhance credit quality and increase transparency.

Final Thoughts

Carbon credits can be a powerful tool to achieve ESG goals and drive organizations toward sustainable growth. Organizations can show their commitment to sustainability by integrating carbon credits into decarbonization strategies. They can also enhance transparency and support co-benefits. Carbon credits will continue shaping the path to a low-carbon, sustainable economy as investor expectations and the regulatory landscape evolve.

[energyandpowerresearchreport]

Carbon Credit Validation and Certification: Fueling a $884 Million Market by 2030

The market size for global carbon credit validation, verification, certification is projected to reach approximately USD 884 million by the year 2030, as compared to the estimated value of USD 226 million in 2024, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 25.5% over the forecast period. The global carbon credit validation, verification, and certification market is driven by several key factors.…

[enengreen]

The Path to Carbon Neutrality: Strategies and Best Practices

As the global urgency for addressing climate change intensifies, businesses are increasingly seeking ways to achieve carbon neutrality and contribute to a more sustainable future. EneGreen, a leading consultancy firm specializing in sustainability and carbon management, has been at the forefront of this movement, offering innovative strategies and best practices to help companies on their journey to carbon neutrality. This article explores the key strategies and best practices shared by EneGreen to guide businesses towards a greener and more sustainable future.

Understanding Carbon Neutrality

Carbon neutrality refers to achieving a balance between emitting carbon and absorbing carbon from the atmosphere in carbon sinks. It involves reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions as much as possible and compensating for the remaining unavoidable emissions through carbon offset projects. EneGreen emphasizes that the path to carbon neutrality is not just about offsetting emissions but also about fundamentally transforming business operations to minimize their carbon footprint.

Key Strategies for Achieving Carbon Neutrality

Comprehensive Carbon Footprint Assessment EneGreen starts by conducting a thorough assessment of a company’s carbon footprint. This involves measuring and analyzing GHG emissions across all operations, including direct emissions (Scope 1), indirect emissions from purchased electricity (Scope 2), and other indirect emissions along the value chain (Scope 3). Accurate measurement is crucial for identifying the most significant sources of emissions and setting a baseline for improvement.

Setting Science-Based Targets Once the carbon footprint is assessed, EneGreen helps companies set science-based targets (SBTs) aligned with the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting global warming to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels. These targets provide a clear and measurable pathway for reducing emissions and ensuring that the company’s climate actions are grounded in scientific reality.

Implementing Energy Efficiency Measures Energy efficiency is one of the most cost-effective ways to reduce carbon emissions. EneGreen works with companies to identify energy-saving opportunities, such as upgrading to energy-efficient lighting and equipment, optimizing HVAC systems, and improving industrial processes. These measures not only reduce emissions but also result in significant cost savings.

Transitioning to Renewable Energy EneGreen advocates for transitioning to renewable energy sources as a critical step towards carbon neutrality. This includes investing in on-site renewable energy installations, such as solar panels or wind turbines, and purchasing green energy from certified renewable energy providers. By shifting to renewable energy, companies can significantly reduce their reliance on fossil fuels and lower their carbon footprint.

Sustainable Supply Chain Management Emissions from the supply chain often constitute a significant portion of a company’s overall carbon footprint. EneGreen assists companies in engaging with suppliers to promote sustainable practices, such as reducing emissions from transportation, sourcing sustainable raw materials, and adopting circular economy principles. Building a sustainable supply chain is essential for achieving comprehensive carbon neutrality.

Carbon Offsetting and Sequestration After maximizing emission reductions, some residual emissions may still remain. EneGreen guides companies in investing in high-quality carbon offset projects, such as reforestation, afforestation, and renewable energy projects in developing countries. These projects help to sequester carbon and compensate for unavoidable emissions, moving companies closer to carbon neutrality.

Best Practices for Sustaining Carbon Neutrality

Continuous Monitoring and Reporting Maintaining carbon neutrality requires ongoing monitoring and transparent reporting of emissions and progress towards targets. EneGreen recommends implementing robust monitoring systems and leveraging digital tools for real-time tracking of emissions. Regular reporting not only ensures accountability but also helps identify areas for further improvement.

Employee Engagement and Training Engaging employees in sustainability initiatives is crucial for driving change. EneGreen advises companies to conduct regular training sessions and workshops to educate employees about the importance of carbon neutrality and how they can contribute. Creating a culture of sustainability within the organization fosters collective action and innovation.

Stakeholder Collaboration Collaboration with stakeholders, including customers, investors, and regulatory bodies, is essential for achieving long-term sustainability goals. EneGreen encourages companies to communicate their carbon neutrality commitments and progress transparently, fostering trust and support from stakeholders. Collaborative efforts can lead to shared resources and knowledge, accelerating the journey towards carbon neutrality.

Adopting Innovative Technologies Technological advancements play a pivotal role in reducing carbon emissions. EneGreen highlights the importance of staying abreast of emerging technologies, such as carbon capture and storage (CCS), hydrogen energy, and smart grid solutions. Investing in innovative technologies can provide new avenues for emission reductions and enhance overall sustainability.

[poojagblog-blog]

The global Direct Air Capture Market is expected to grow from an estimated USD 62 million in 2023 to USD 1,727 million by 2030, at a CAGR of 60.9% during the 2023–2030 period according to a new report by MarketsandMarkets™. 

[gauravverma5778]

ES Ranganathan Advocates Overseas Carbon Credit Trade for India's Climate Ambitions

India has set a big goal to reach net-zero emissions by 2070. This means they want to balance out the amount of greenhouse gases they produce with the amount they remove from the atmosphere. To help achieve this goal, India is thinking about new ways to cut down on carbon emissions. This is important because countries worldwide are working hard to reduce their carbon footprint due to climate change.

One major idea being considered is allowing India to trade carbon credits with other countries. This would involve linking carbon credits with Green Hydrogen. Mr. ES Ranganathan explains that India is a diverse country with a fast-growing economy. As the economy grows, so do carbon emissions, especially from industries and energy production. By trading carbon credits internationally, India can speed up its efforts to reduce emissions. This means they can buy carbon credits from other countries to balance out their own emissions, especially in sectors where it's hard to cut down.

Let's talk a bit about carbon credits. They're like certificates that show you've done something to reduce or remove greenhouse gases from the air. Organizations or countries can buy these credits to offset their own emissions. For example, they might invest in projects like planting trees, using renewable energy, or improving industrial processes. This helps encourage people to find ways to cut down on emissions and be more eco-friendly.

India has already been working towards cleaner energy. They've been boosting their use of renewable energy, making things more energy efficient, and aiming to have more electric vehicles on the roads. These efforts are part of their commitment to fighting climate change and making the planet healthier for everyone.

Read More

[therealtorasia]

Vietnam collected more than 1,000 billion VND from selling carbon credits

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development sold carbon credits obtained from forests in the North Central region to the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) of the World Bank. This was part of an agreement to reduce greenhouse emissions. As part of the agreement, 10.3 million tons of CO2 were transferred to the World Bank and sold for 51.5 million USD. The Ministry…

[sternsolar]

Earn Income with Solar Panels - Carbon Credit Guide

Discover how to monetize your solar panels by selling carbon offset credits. Learn about carbon credit markets, verification, and trading for income.

[dsiddhant]

The global Carbon Offset/Carbon Credit Market is expected to grow from an estimated USD 414.8 billion in 2023 to USD 1,602.7 billion by 2028, at a CAGR of 31.0% during the forecast period.

[fcfindia]

Use of ESG Investing

By considering ESG(Environmental, Social, and Governance)  factors alongside financial metrics, investors can gain deeper insights into a company's long-term value, risk management practices. ESG investing can be used to construct investment portfolios that align with an investor's values and sustainability objectives.

[iwan1979]

carbon credit, plastic credit, what else? air credit? As the global plastic-pollution crisis continues to deepen, key stakeholders must come together to find and fund solutions. The introduction of plastic credits has brought with it a renewed cause for optimism.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Activists and scientists have been warning for years that schemes to offset carbon emissions by planting trees or other crops would lead to a surge in land grabbing, especially in the global South. These warnings are now proving true. GRAIN combed through the various registries of carbon offset projects to try and get a better sense of this new land grab and how it is unfolding. We identified 279 large-scale tree and crop planting projects for carbon credits that corporations have initiated since 2016 in the global South. They cover over 9.1 million hectares of land -- an area roughly the size of Portugal. The deals add up to a massive new form of land grabbing that will only increase conflicts and pressures over land that are still simmering from the last global land grab spree that erupted in 2007-8 in the wake of global food and financial crises. They also signify that new sources of money are now flowing into the coffers of companies specialised in taking lands from communities in the South to enrich and serve corporations, mainly in the North. To date, 52 countries in the global South have been targeted by these projects. Half the projects are in just four countries: China, India, Brazil and Colombia, which are developing their own industries of carbon project developers. But projects in these countries account for less than a third of the total land area involved. The most affected region, in terms of land area, is Africa, with projects covering over 5.2 million hectares. Many of the projects involve land deals to set up giant eucalyptus, acacia or bamboo plantations. Typically, these are pasture lands or savannahs that were used until now by local communities for grazing livestock or growing food.

17 September 2024

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The impoverished imagination of neoliberal climate “solutions

This morning (Oct 31) at 10hPT, the Internet Archive is livestreaming my presentation on my recent book, The Internet Con.

There is only one planet in the known universe capable of sustaining human life, and it is rapidly becoming uninhabitable by humans. Clearly, this warrants bold action – but which bold action should we take?

After half a century of denial and disinformation, the business lobby has seemingly found climate religion and has joined the choir, but they have their own unique hymn: this crisis is so dire, they say, that we don't have the luxury of choosing between different ways of addressing the emergency. We have to do "all of the above" – every possible solution must be tried.

In his new book Dark PR, Grant Ennis explains that this "all of the above" strategy doesn't represent a change of heart by big business. Rather, it's part of the denial playbook that's been used to sell tobacco-cancer doubt and climate disinformation:

https://darajapress.com/publication/dark-pr-how-corporate-disinformation-harms-our-health-and-the-environment

The point of "all of the above" isn't muscular, immediate action – rather, it's a delaying tactic that creates space for "solutions" that won't work, but will generate profits. Think of how the tobacco industry used "all of the above" to sell "light" cigarettes, snuff, snus, and vaping – and delay tobacco bans, sin taxes, and business-euthanizing litigation. Today, the same playbook is used to sell EVs as an answer to the destructive legacy of the personal automobile – to the exclusion of mass transit, bikes, and 15-minute cities:

https://thewaroncars.org/2023/10/24/113-dark-pr-with-grant-ennis/

As the tobacco and car examples show, "all of the above" is never really all of the above. Pursuing "light" cigarettes to reduce cancer is incompatible with simply banning tobacco; giving everyone a personal EV is incompatible with remaking our cities for transit, cycling and walking.

When it comes to the climate emergency, "all of the above" means trying "market-based" solutions to the exclusion of directly regulating emissions, despite the poor performance of these "solutions."

The big one here is carbon offsets, which allows companies to make money by promising not to emit carbon that they would otherwise emit. The idea here is that creating a new asset class will unleash the incredible creativity of markets by harnessing the greed of elite sociopaths to the project of decarbonization, rather of the prudence of democratically accountable lawmakers.

Carbon offsets have not worked: they have been plagued by absolutely foreseeable problems that have not lessened, despite repeated attempts to mitigate them.

For starters, carbon offsets are a classic market for lemons. The cheapest way to make a carbon offset is to promise not to emit carbon you were never going to emit anyway, as when fake charities like the Nature Conservancy make millions by promising not to log forests that can't be logged because they are wildlife preserves:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/03/18/greshams-carbon-law/#papal-indulgences

Then there's the problem of monitoring carbon offsetting activity. Like, what happens when the forest you promise not to log burns down? If you're a carbon trader, the answer is "nothing." That burned-down forest can still be sold as if it were sequestering carbon, rather than venting it to the atmosphere in an out-of-control blaze:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/07/26/aggregate-demand/#murder-offsets

When you bought a plane ticket and ticked the "offset the carbon on my flight" box and paid an extra $10, I bet you thought that you were contributing to a market that incentivized a reduction in discretionary, socially useless carbon-intensive activity. But without those carbon offsets, SUVs would have all but disappeared from American roads. Carbon offsets for Tesla cars generated billions in carbon offsets for Elon Musk, and allowed SUVs to escape regulations that would otherwise have seen them pulled from the market:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/11/24/no-puedo-pagar-no-pagara/#Rat

What's more, Tesla figured out how to get double the offsets they were entitled to by pretending that they had a working battery-swap technology. This directly translated to even more SUVs on the road:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Tesla,_Inc.#Misuse_of_government_subsidies

Harnessing the profit motive to the planet's survivability might sound like a good idea, but it assumes that corporations can self-regulate their way to a better climate future. They cannot. Think of how Canada's logging industry was allowed to clearcut old-growth forests and replace them with "pines in lines" – evenly spaced, highly flammable, commercially useful tree-farms that now turn into raging forest fires every year:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/16/murder-offsets/#pulped-and-papered

The idea of "market-based" climate solutions is that certain harmful conduct should be disincentivized through taxes, rather than banned. This makes carbon offsets into a kind of modern Papal indulgence, which let you continue to sin, for a price. As the outstanding short video Murder Offsets so ably demonstrates, this is an inadequate, unserious and immoral response to the urgency of the issue:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/14/for-sale-green-indulgences/#killer-analogy

Offsets and other market-based climate measures aren't "all of the above" – they exclude other measures that have better track-records and lower costs, because those measures cut against the interests of the business lobby. Writing for the Law and Political Economy Project, Yale Law's Douglas Kysar gives some pointed examples:

https://lpeproject.org/blog/climate-change-and-the-neoliberal-imagination/

For example: carbon offsets rely on a notion called "contrafactual carbon," this being the imaginary carbon that might be omitted by a company if it wasn't participating in offsets. The number of credits a company gets is determined by the difference between its contrafactual emissions and its actual emissions.

But the "contrafactual" here comes from a business-as-usual world, one where the only limit on carbon emissions comes from corporate executives' voluntary actions – and not from regulation, direct action, or other limits on corporate conduct.

Kysar asks us to imagine a contrafactual that depends on "carbon upsets," rather than offsets – one where the limits on carbon come from "lawsuits, referenda, protests, boycotts, civil disobedience":

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cif-green/2010/aug/29/carbon-upsets-offsets-cap-and-trade

If we're really committed to "all of the above" as baseline for calculating offsets, why not imagine a carbon world grounded in foreseeable, evidence-based reality, like the situation in Louisiana, where a planned petrochemical plant was canceled after a lawsuit over its 13.6m tons of annual carbon emissions?

https://earthjustice.org/press/2022/louisiana-court-vacates-air-permits-for-formosas-massive-petrochemical-complex-in-cancer-alley

Rather than a tradeable market in carbon offsets, we could harness the market to reward upsets. If your group wins a lawsuit that prevents 13.6m tons of carbon emissions every year, it will get 13.6 million credits for every year that plant would have run. That would certainly drive the commercial imaginations of many otherwise disinterested parties to find carbon-reduction measures. If we're going to revive dubious medieval practices like indulgences, why not champerty, too?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champerty_and_maintenance

That is, if every path to a survivable planet must run through Goldman-Sachs, why not turn their devious minds to figuring out ways to make billions in tradeable credits by suing the pants off oil companies?

There are any number of measures that rise to the flimsy standards of evidence in support of offsets. Like, we're giving away $85/ton in free public money for carbon capture technologies, despite the lack of any credible path to these making a serious dent in the climate situation:

https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insights/latest-news/energy-transition/072523-ira-turbocharged-carbon-capture-tax-credit-but-challenges-persist-experts

If we're willing to fund untested longshots like carbon capture, why not measures that have far better track-records? For example, there's a pretty solid correlation between the presence of women in legislatures and on corporate boards and overall reductions in carbon. I'm the last person to suggest that the problems of capitalism can be replaced by replacing half of the old white men who run the world with women, PoCs and queers – but if we're willing to hand billions to ferkakte scheme like carbon capture, why not subsidize companies that pack their boards with women, or provide campaign subsidies to women running for office? It's quite a longshot (putting Liz Truss or Marjorie Taylor-Greene on your board or in your legislature is no way to save the planet), but it's got a better evidentiary basis than carbon capture.

There's also good evidence that correlates inequality with carbon emissions, though the causal relationship is unclear. Maybe inequality lets the wealthy control policy outcomes and tilt them towards permitting high-emission/high-profit activities. Maybe inequality reduces the social cohesion needed to make decarbonization work. Maybe inequality makes it harder for green tech to find customers. Maybe inequality leads to rich people chasing status-enhancing goods (think: private jet rides) that are extremely carbon-intensive.

Whatever the reason, there's a pretty good case that radical wealth redistribution would speed up decarbonization – any "all of the above" strategy should certainly consider this one.

Kysar's written a paper on this, entitled "Ways Not to Think About Climate Change":

https://political-theory.org/resources/Documents/Kysar.Ways%20Not%20to%20Think%20About%20Climate%20Change.pdf

It's been accepted for the upcoming American Society for Political and Legal Philosophy conference on climate change:

https://political-theory.org/13257256

It's quite a bracing read! The next time someone tells you we should hand Elon Musk billions to in exchange for making it possible to legally manufacture vast fleets of SUVs because we need to try "all of the above," send them a copy of this paper.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/31/carbon-upsets/#big-tradeoff