By Susanna Twidale
LONDON, July 29 (Reuters) - A global initiative was launched
on Thursday to bring transparency and rigour to the voluntary
carbon market that is expected to grow rapidly over the next few
years as countries and companies strive to meet climate targets.
Offsets, generated through emission reductions such as
planting trees or switching to less polluting fuels, currently
trade in a voluntary market, often on a project-by-project basis
with different standards and approaches.
The Voluntary Carbon Markets Integrity Initiative (VCMI)
aims to ensure carbon offsets are underpinned by real actions to
reduce greenhouse gas emissions and help developing countries
access climate finance generated by the market.
It is sponsored by Britain and the philanthropic Children's
Investment Fund Foundation, and has the backing of several
governments including the United States.
“There are lots of people jumping into the voluntary market
now without a broad consensus or agreement on assurance and
integrity,” VCMI co-chair Rachel Kyte said.
A task force created to scale up the voluntary carbon market
has said the market will need to grow 15-fold to meet goals set
under the Paris Agreement and could be worth as much as $50
billion by 2030.
The expected growth has led to an explosion of private
sector interest, with trading houses setting up carbon desks and
exchanges launching new voluntary carbon market products.
“We want to try to bring more and more countries and
businesses into this conversation which tends to get dominated
sometimes by the louder, shoutier voices in the global business
community,” said Kyte.
Other governments backing the scheme include Cambodia,
Ghana, Kenya.
“We welcome the VCMI’s focus on clear norms for companies to
use high-quality carbon credits, including toward their net zero
targets in a way that is credible, transparent, and aligned with
the goal to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees,” U.S. climate
change envoy John Kerry said in a statement.
(Reporting By Susanna Twidale; Editing by Mike Harrison)