Carbon Pulse

EU industries have another thing to worry about when it comes to the EU's proposed carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM), and have moved on from campaigning against the removal of free allowances, to opposing the policy's scope expansion, because of its knock-on effect for government handouts.

A Pennsylvania judge on Friday afternoon blocked the state from implementing its RGGI-linked cap-and-trade regulation just one week after the state entered the power sector carbon market, with further court hearings on the legality of the programme scheduled for this fall. 

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A European carbon price of around $300 per tonne in 2030 is required to remain on an 'orderly' pathway to a Paris Agreement-aligned warming target, according to modelling in the European Central Bank's first climate stress test published Friday that said stringent policy measures were urgently required to avoid billions of financial losses across euro zone banks.

Sustainable agriculture firm UPL on Friday announced the European leg of its plan to sequester 1 bln tonnes of CO2 through the generation of carbon offsets.

EU ETS prices ended H1 2022 nearly 12% higher than where they ended 2021, as soaring energy costs have raised the spectre of carbon demand destruction despite a steady bullish drumbeat coming from the revival in coal-fired power generation as Europe accelerates its switch away from Russian fossil fuels.

Countries including France made a tad more progress in June handing out this year’s free carbon permit allocations under the EU ETS, according to data from the European Commission.

A new blockchain-based carbon venture that raised some $2.4 million in crypto coins in a recent launch will initially offer trade in tokenised EUAs and other compliance carbon units while promising a 916,474% first-year return for those investing in its governance token.

Carbon was heading for its first five-day loss in a month on Friday morning, albeit amid modest volume and wide bid-offer spreads, while energy commodities also snapped their recent run of strong bullish performances amid speculation that gas flows from Russia could soon increase.

The UK has dished out £54 million across multiple carbon removal projects as the country looks to scale the technology to meet its mid-century net-zero target, the government announced Friday.

Total holdings of NZUs in the national registry were up around 9% in the June quarter year-on-year as speculators continue to take up a growing space in a market whose historical permit surplus keeps growing, an update by New Zealand’s Environmental Protection Authority showed.

Allowances in China’s carbon market edged up over the past week, although the lack of policy direction continues to dampen market participants’ enthusiasm.

Some of Australia’s biggest carbon emitters surrendered a total of 1.1 million units and certificates in financial year 2020/21, according to a new report by the Clean Energy Regulator that for the first time tracks company progress towards voluntary commitments, though many heavy emitters have made minimal progress on meeting their goals.  

Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province has significant forest carbon potential, with officials aiming to create a “gateway” for carbon offset buyers and for investors to channel finance towards forest carbon sequestration projects, a local voluntary carbon market working group forum was told on Thursday.

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

The Bahamas’ Prime Minister Philip Davis on Wednesday unveiled legislation to introduce regulation for carbon trading on the archipelago, including large fines and jail terms for any wrongdoing.

European governments should implement a floor price in the EU ETS, a group of think-tanks has argued, as the market’s wild fluctuations make investing in innovative decarbonisation solutions difficult for heavy industry.

A New York congressman on Wednesday penned an open letter to standard bodies Verra and American Carbon Registry (ACR), asking them to once again allow companies to tokenise retired carbon credits.

WCI emitters in the second quarter shifted the fewest number of allowances into compliance accounts since 2016, as the allowance glut of the linked cap-and-trade system ticked up to a new all-time high, according to programme data published Thursday.

California Carbon Allowance (CCA) prices retraced this week but still held onto gains from the volatile end of the second quarter, while RGGI Allowances (RGAs) was up slightly as Pennsylvania officially entered the bloc, barring a court decision.