Carbon Pulse

Republican members of Congress arrived at COP29 in Baku Saturday to pitch US natural gas and nuclear energy as decarbonisation solutions for the world, arguing that exports can help increase energy security and decrease costs.

With deforestation compromising Brazil’s hydropower generation capacity, REDD+ projects are one way to address the threats to electricity supply, according to a study presented at COP29.

The federal government of Pakistan unveiled its international carbon market regulations at COP29 in Baku on Saturday following two years of work, including fee structures for international credit transactions, and is expected to launch a national carbon registry by Q1 2025.

The COP29 climate finance text was still a mess midway through the summit, as several delegations described difficulty in engaging with key elements of the current draft, and observers suggesting they do not expect a strong outcome in Baku for the headline objective of the summit.

Sustainable sources of carbon will be necessary in a net-zero economy – chiefly in petrochemicals and steelmaking – paving the way for green sources of CO2 derived from biomass to scale up negative emissions after 2050, the Dutch vice-minister for climate said at the COP29 summit in Baku, Azerbaijan.

A group of Brazil-based nature-based solutions (NBS) project developers and the nation’s export agency signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on Friday to promote the sale of carbon credits abroad.

The SBSTA UN advisory body has laid out final exit protocols for the Kyoto-era Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), predecessor to the Paris Agreement Crediting Mechanism (PACM), at COP29 in a draft text.

While the election of US President Donald Trump is expected to generally stifle US momentum on climate action, there may exist avenues for increased voluntary carbon market (VCM) enthusiasm under his leadership, market participants told Carbon Pulse on the sidelines of COP29.

Captive coal-fired power plants (CFPPs), a large and growing source of emissions in Indonesia, will be covered under the country’s emissions trading scheme (ETS) from next year, according to the head of its Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP) secretariat.

Climate negotiators are struggling to agree on how to move forward with last year’s milestone commitment to transition away from fossil fuels, with emerging economies pushing to keep any reference out of this year’s COP29 agreement. 

Morocco will launch and implement an Article 6 framework in the coming months, culminating in offtake agreements involving millions of Internationally Transferred Mitigation Outcomes (ITMOs), according to a government advisor speaking to Carbon Pulse on the sidelines of COP29 in Baku.

Bolivia’s about-face on carbon markets continued this week as the government teamed up with a US-based environmental data platform for help measuring carbon stocks and emissions, aiming to unlock the country's domestic offering.

It is Day 6 at COP29 in Baku - Science Day. It's the final day negotiators have with the texts before they're handed over to the presidency and appointed ministers, although not much progress is expected on finance in the next 24 hours. In our daily running blog, Carbon Pulse will report relevant or useful updates throughout the day. Timestamps are in local time (GMT+4).

North Dakota’s Public Service Commission (PSC) has approved a permit for a multi-state CO2 pipeline, clearing path for project development in the state amid permitting struggles in other regions.

Most entities covered under Washington’s cap-and-invest programme fulfilled their annual compliance obligation in 2023 as only one entity fell short, a report from the state’s Department of Ecology (ECY) released Friday showed.

US think tank RMI will be working closely with Emissions Intensive Trade Exposed (EITE) facilities active under Washington state’s cap-and-invest programme, to research viable decarbonisation pathways for various industries.

Financial entities axed their net California Carbon Allowance (CCA) holdings into the upcoming Q4 auction and with the delay in highly-anticipated regulatory updates that pulled prices lower this week, while producers built their positions across North American carbon markets, according to data released Friday from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).

A British carbon finance specialist, Swiss bank, and Scottish carbon capture and storage (CCS) firm have partnered to issue carbon removals credits from Scotch whiskey distilleries and their supply chains, the companies announced on Friday.

An increasing number of countries have committed to reduce their methane emissions, with proposals to strengthen their goals and mobilise nearly $500 million to support 65 developing countries.

The federal government of Tanzania has teamed up with a Nairobi-based cookstoves manufacturer and project developer to distribute 1 million clean cookstoves throughout the East African nation to be funded by voluntary carbon credits.