🌍 Carbon Certification Standards: a global perspective on emerging domestic trends 👇
As the carbon market matures, carbon certification standards—frameworks ensuring that carbon credits represent real, measurable, and verifiable climate benefits—are increasingly at the forefront of discussions. While global standards like Verra's VCS and Gold Standard dominate the space, national and domestic standards are gaining traction 💹
But what exactly are these standards?
💡 Here’s a Rough Definition: National or domestic carbon certification standards are country-specific frameworks designed to guide the development, registration, and issuance of carbon credits. These schemes often reflect national priorities, regulatory contexts, and alignment with international climate agreements. They are often run by government authorities, sometimes by affiliated organisations and are available in the local language.
✈️ From the West to the East: Domestic schemes are emerging as targeted competitors to global standards. Initially taking place in Western countries, it is now taking place across Asia where J-Credits and Thai-VER are pioneers, and where Korea, Mongolia and Malaysia have recently (or will soon) launch their own schemes.
🔍 Why this Trend is Emerging:
Governments are seeking greater control over carbon market revenues and ensuring alignment with Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs)
They aim to reduce reliance on international schemes and have schemes that are simpler and more cost-effective for project certification
Tailored standards allow for region-specific considerations, such as language, target sectors, and the use of tailored carbon accounting estimation
📈 Potential evolution:
The next decade could see a proliferation of domestic schemes, with more countries designing standards that align with Article 6 of the Paris Agreement and that could be used for 6.2 transactions, like in Premium T-VER in Thailand and JCM in Japan
Greater regional cooperation may lead to harmonized standards across economic blocs, facilitating cross-border carbon trading while maintaining high integrity, such as the efforts spearheaded by Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia
💬 What do you think about this trend? Are national and domestic standards a step toward inclusivity and sovereignty in the carbon market, or do they risk fragmenting the global carbon market landscape even further?
🎨 Our infographic delves into these trends with visuals on:
- A geographical visualisation of domestic standards' locations
- Comparative numbers of projects under independent vs. national domestic standards
- A geographical representation of independent standards’ decision-making location (headquarters)
(The high resolution visual is available when you download this image and links to the standards are available in the comments)
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