Carbon Pulse

The EU should aim to reach net zero emissions by 2045 at the latest - five years earlier than its current goal - to have a shot of remaining within a Paris Agreement-aligned 1.5 C warming scenario this century, researchers said in a report this week as officials prepare to increase the bloc's collective pledge.

The leading exchange-traded fund in compliance carbon markets has sold a significant slice of its holdings in EU allowances, a move coming amid growing investor short positioning as the 27-nation bloc considers drastically boosting the market's near-term supply to help fund its energy transition.

Massachusetts’ power sector Global Warming Solutions Act (GWSA) cap-and-trade system saw its current vintage allowance auction clear $5 above the previous sale, while the programme’s second sale for future permits settled a little over half that price, according to results published Wednesday.

More than 200 industry leaders backed plans for zero-emissions aluminium, ammonia, steel on Wednesday, offering policymakers a guide for sector-level regulations and investment while providing tools to back the growing momentum behind sectoral mitigation targets at the international level.

A voluntary carbon market (VCM) analytics firm has signed deals to supply its project and offset valuation data to several inter-dealer brokers to help its clients gain better access to the market.

The Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market (IC-VCM) needs a course correction in order to avoid significantly harming the VER space through its plans to assess carbon credit quality, the world’s largest offset standard manager and developer Verra said Wednesday.

A carbon credit ratings agency has awarded high grades to two Verra-accredited peatland restoration projects in Indonesia that are among the biggest credit generators in the market.

EUA prices dipped below a key technical support on Wednesday as the September options contract neared expiry and as the Ukraine conflict appeared set to continue amid a new Russian buildup of forces, while energy prices also jumped as the crisis showed no signs of ending.

One of the big five banks in Canada is backing the country's largest ever private conservation project in exchange for offsets, and is also forming an advisory unit to assist others in carbon market activities, the company announced Wednesday.

A Japanese research project has produced the nation’s first direct air capture (DAC) test device, while regulators on Wednesday also registered a first livestock manure project under the domestic J-Credit scheme.

The UK government announced a support package for businesses and ETS-covered industrials on Wednesday in which wholesale energy prices will be capped at "less than half" of expected winter levels in a bid to avoid mass demand shutdowns and economic disruption.

Demand for natural gas from energy-intensive industrial companies in Europe has fallen by around 30% in recent weeks as the region grapples with the soaring costs of energy and a worsening economic outlook, Jean-Pierre Clamadieu, chairman of utility Engie said on Wednesday.

European demand for seaborne coal is predicted to increase by 14% in 2022 as the bloc struggles to address the energy crisis, but the rise will not trigger any significant investment and global demand is expected to continue to trend downwards, analysts said on Tuesday.

Two fintech firms based in Singapore and France have formed a partnership to promote data-backed carbon credits with end-to-end traceability in a project that will enable greater transparency of the carbon credit lifecycle, with buyers and users able to access attributes and data of carbon credits via a standardised registry, they announced on Wednesday.

An Australian green group on Wednesday called on major emitters to avoid using carbon credits towards their CO2 targets, accentuating the growing distance between those considering offsets as part of the climate solution and those dismissing them as greenwash.

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

Compliance carbon markets have only had mixed success in reducing emissions, as insufficient price levels, uncertainty over cap-setting, and loopholes mitigate their effectiveness, according to a report released Tuesday.

A Danish startup this week unveiled a data-driven model to significantly fast-track voluntary carbon credit issuances.

Member states risk weakening the EU ETS with their proposals on how to bring shipping into the scheme, and in the process could reduce the industry’s compliance costs by as much as €20 billion, an environmental NGO has warned.

Two firms have signed a memorandum of understanding worth 2 million tonnes of CO2 removals from bioenergy capture and storage (BECCS) capacity over a five-year period, which they called the "world's biggest" agreement of its kind.