Carbon Pulse

A daily summary of our news plus bite-sized updates from around the world.

Amsterdam-headquartered environmental commodities trading firm STX Group on Wednesday announced its first foray into the asset management industry with the launch of a global carbon fund that seeks to “catch the potential upside” of emissions trading schemes outside of Europe.

An Australia-based fintech firm has formed a partnership with a global exchange operator to offer its carbon credit pricing data to subscribers on its platform, the companies announced Thursday.

A campaign to encourage businesses and financial institutions worldwide to submit nature-related strategies has been announced by Business for Nature.

California increased the issuance of compliance offsets over the last two weeks as credits tagged with direct environmental benefits to the state (DEBs) also rose, as more entities retired units for voluntary purposes in recent months, according to data published by the state regulator ARB on Wednesday.

The energy transition “has not truly started” and is almost certain to result in overshooting the Paris Agreement’s temperature limits, while a suite of geopolitical, technological, and policy forces set the stage for non-fossil energy sources to contribute half of the world’s energy mix in 2050, a new report said Wednesday.

A collection of Canadian financial and food firms on Tuesday launched a new alliance to slash emissions from the country’s agri-food sector by 2050, with the group hoping that helping improve soil carbon measurement and reporting will help achieve the goal.

A San Francisco-based voluntary carbon market sales company on Wednesday announced it has secured $2.25 mln in pre-seed funding for its plan to offer a diverse portfolio of credits in alignment with academic guidance.

The World Trade Organisation has reiterated it is working on a global carbon pricing framework to avoid a patchwork of different mechanisms popping up around the world, a representative told the Carbon Forward conference on Wednesday.

The UK will focus on bringing certainty and simplicity to Article 6 international emissions trade at COP28 UN negotiations, officials said on Wednesday, while reaffirming that the country does not intend to use international credits to meet its 2030 nationally determined contribution (NDC).

Pakistan is working to build a framework for how it will approach Article 6 international emissions trade and is in talks with several parties around bilateral agreements, according to a government official, while also working on sectoral targets as part of its nationally determined contributions (NDCs).

Corporates in some of the hardest to abate and polluting industrial sectors will make money from carbon markets in the next few years by deploying hedging strategies or receiving free allowances, amid the hodge podge of trading schemes around the world, an analyst told the Carbon Forward conference Wednesday.

Credits from UK woodland and peatland carbon projects are some of the most expensive units in the voluntary carbon market, data revealed Wednesday.

The head of the body guiding which carbon cutting projects will be credited under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement is confident that finalised recommendations would not be rejected by countries during negotiations at COP28, but remains apprehensive on their reaction to the soon-to-be finalised document, she told the Carbon Forward conference on Wednesday.

The parliament of Malaysia on Wednesday passed legislation to regulate the country’s biggest energy consumers and ensure energy conservation in the country, according to media reports, a move expected to cut carbon emissions by 200 MtCO2e by mid-century.

European carbon prices clawed back early losses on Wednesday morning, as initial weakness triggered by falling energy prices was subsequently outweighed by the weekly Commitment of Traders data that showed investment funds had increased their net short position last week.

People involved with developing the EU’s list of sustainable activities are unhappy with how it has addressed biodiversity so far, the ex-biodiversity lead for influential advisory group Platform on Sustainable Finance (PSF) has said.

The Tokyo Stock Exchange (TSE) on Wednesday launched its carbon credit trading platform, though activity remained muted on the opening day as demand and supply are both limited.

Much of the methane emitted today as part of fossil fuel production could be avoided, limiting the warming gases emitted into the environment and helping to keep global temperatures below 1.5C above pre-industrial times, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said Wednesday.

Investments in nature still make up only a minor part of the sustainable finance market, though their share of the ESG bond market is increasing and there is growth potential for carbon credits with nature-based co-benefits as well as in the emerging biocredit market, according to new analysis.