Carbon Pulse

The Washington Department of Ecology (ECY) on Tuesday published its draft WCI-modelled cap-and-trade regulation, lowering the programme’s emissions baseline compared to the agency’s previous thinking and proposing the same allowance floor and ceiling prices as the California carbon market.

A US-based soil carbon startup has raised $18 mln in Series A funding from investors including Bloomberg and Microsoft.

Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) has nominated four members to Virginia’s Air Pollution Control Board (APCB) in a move that sets the stage for plans to unravel the state’s RGGI linkage this summer.

Emitters in the RGGI cap-and-trade programme added carbon permits in between the Mar. 9 sale and the end of the month, as prices retreated on the secondary market, according to a report published Tuesday.

More countries are likely to follow the move by the Indonesia government, which has halted the issuance of carbon credits from projects in the country until it has finalised its new carbon policy, a major carbon credit company said in a conference call Tuesday for its quarterly results.

The European Commission is considering selling 200-250 million EU carbon allowances currently held in the MSR as part of the bloc's RePowerEU initiative, the FT reported on Tuesday, citing anonymous EU officials and diplomats.

A carbon credit marketplace and a global ratings agency for the voluntary carbon market (VCM) have teamed up with the aim of providing customers greater confidence in the quality of the units they buy.

A proposal for scaling up carbon contracts for difference (CCfD) is expected to feature in the European Commission's RePowerEU strategy this week, strengthening support for a powerful tool to spur investment in industrial decarbonisation but with lessons to remember from the UK’s experience using the mechanism in the power sector.

French utility Engie will keep buying Russian gas from Gazprom in light of new guidelines from the European Commission on how to avoid direct payments in rubles, it said in first-quarter results on Tuesday that also announced soaring profits and raised 2022 earnings targets.

Huge inflows of foreign investment will flood into green hydrogen projects in Egypt, noted analysts Tuesday, after the government announced it would unveil a national hydrogen plan in the coming months ahead of hosting COP27 in November.

EUAs eased back from an early six-day high on Tuesday morning as traders braced themselves ahead of the European Parliament's environment committee vote on suggested amendments to the Fit for 55 EU ETS reform proposals.

Southeast Asia’s reliance on fossil fuels to meet its rapidly growing energy needs is a significant vulnerability given today’s energy crisis, but regional efforts to meet climate and energy security goals will need a sharp increase in investment, the International Energy Agency (IEA) warned in a report released Tuesday.

The European Parliament's environment committee (ENVI) has voted for a 67% emissions reduction target for 2030 for the EU ETS, supporting an earlier compromise deal that goes beyond the European Commission's proposed 61%, according to a vote list seen by Carbon Pulse.

The European Parliament’s Environment Committee (ENVI) has voted on the amendments of a first batch of the Fit for 55 climate policy package, on aviation ETS, the Effort Sharing Regulation (ESR) and land use LULUCF Regulation covering non-ETS sectors, as well as a draft opinion on the Renewable Energy Directive (RED). 

A New Zealand forestry group has argued that the country will be unable to meet net zero emissions by 2050 target if it removes exotic tree species from its ETS, based on figures in the government’s Emissions Reduction Plan.

The CEO of Australian offset project development firm Climate Positive has died.

A crypto company that sells carbon removal tokens on Tuesday launched a three-day auction in which interested parties can buy the right to help govern the firm.

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

Lobbying is mounting in shipping markets to dedicate revenues from a proposed global carbon levy into decarbonising the maritime sector.

A decision on whether to block RGGI compliance obligations from taking effect on Pennsylvania’s power generators will occur after the cap-and-trade programme’s June auction, according to a Commonwealth Court order published Friday.