Heed the McCall - Citadel has reportedly parted ways with Jay McCall, the founding member of its renewable fuels team and former head of North American environmental products trading. McCall has now resurfaced at Jain Global in San Francisco, efinancialcareers.com reports, where he is building a broader environmental products trading platform spanning carbon markets, renewable electricity, and renewable fuels. His new remit appears larger than the role he held at Citadel, and he seems to have moved without serving the firm’s typically lengthy non-compete period. The move comes amid intensified hiring across commodities teams in multi-manager hedge funds, with Verition recently doubling its commodities pods and adding energy traders. Jain Global has also been active, acquiring wholesale gas marketer Anahau Energy in September and recruiting several senior commodities specialists, though some hires have departed quickly. McCall had joined Citadel in 2021 from DTE Energy Trading alongside Erica Reicher, who continues to lead environmental products origination for Citadel in North America.

Skippers fire flares – Carbon market analysts from the Canadian Climate Institute have suggested the Alberta-Canada MoU could trigger a slippery slope for Canada’s climate policy landscape. In an op-ed first published in the Hill Times, the trio wrote the deal risks fracturing the foundation of Canada’s entire approach to tackling climate change and, with other provinces getting in line for their own special treatment, could kickstart a race to the bottom for Canadian climate policy.

Herding CO2 – Bison Low Carbon Ventures has completed commissioning operations of the first phase of its Meadowbrook Carbon Storage Hub near Legal, Alberta. The Phase 1 facility is licensed to inject up to 500,000 tCO2 per year. Bison said it hopes to scale the facility to 3 Mt per year. Meadowbrook is the first carbon capture and storage hub to enter service in Alberta, the company said. It’s partnered with Deep Sky Alpha.

Release the records – A federal judge has directed the US DOE to release records from the recently-disbanded Climate Working Group, after the Justice Department dropped its defence of claims that the agency violated federal transparency laws by assembling climate-sceptic advisers to support repealing the US EPA’s endangerment finding. Judge William Young of the US District Court for the District of Massachusetts ordered the DOE to provide the documents to the Environmental Defense Fund within two weeks, following a prior ruling that the task force was likely subject to the Federal Advisory Committee Act’s openness requirements. (E&E News)

Budget backslide - A new report from US non-profit Environmental Integrity Project found that more than half of US states have cut their environmental agency budgets over the past 15 years, even as the Trump administration pursues major reductions to the US EPA. The report found 27 states reduced pollution-control funding and 31 cut staff, with the steepest reductions in Mississippi, South Dakota, and Connecticut, and significant cuts in Texas and Louisiana despite rapid industrial growth. The EPA’s inflation-adjusted budget has fallen 40% since 2010, with further cuts proposed for 2026. The report warned that weakened federal and state agencies could leave communities more exposed to air and water pollution.

Central American countries hold sizeable technical potential to reduce emissions from agriculture and livestock through sustainable land-use practices, yet remain at an early stage of readiness to leverage international carbon markets, according to a new study.

Corporates should be allowed to use Environmental Attribute Certificates (EACs) to count directly towards targets set by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), a non-profit has urged, while another flagged concerns with the voluntary tiered approach and a lack of guidance for near-term carbon removals. 

The incoming administration of Virginia Governor-elect Abigail Spanberger (D) faces multiple pathways to rejoin RGGI, with the timing and mechanism carrying implications for allowance distribution, prices, and the broader political balance between decarbonisation and consumer affordability concerns, experts told Carbon Pulse.

Clean Canadian concrete – Canadian concrete decarbonisation company, alterBiota, announced Wednesday that its flagship product has officially entered its commercialisation phase. The product, known as deltaC, is a biochar-based admixture that reduces the carbon footprint of concrete by up to 30%, the company said. During the company’s summer commercialisation drive, over 100 cubic metres of deltaC was used in a range of commercial projects, from sidewalks to structural pads. In those applications, the product reduced carbon footprint levels by 10-22%.

Greenwash grind – A federal magistrate judge declined to throw out a proposed class action accusing US company Florida Crystals of misleading consumers with claims that its sugar is environmentally responsible, while directing the plaintiff to refine her allegations, E&E News reported. The US District Court for the Northern District of California said customer Macy Merrell may file a revised complaint by Jan. 9, after parts of her earlier filing were dismissed. Merrell argued the company’s branding as ‘climate-friendly’ contradicts its practice of pre-harvest sugarcane burning, which she said harms the environment. The judge found Merrell’s opposition brief created inconsistencies with her prior assertions, but allowed the case to proceed with a clarified complaint.

The Q4 Washington auction settled just above $70, marking the highest auction settlement price recorded in the history of Washington’s cap-and-invest programme.

A Republican state senator has proposed repealing provisions of a foundational climate law requiring New York to establish rules for a cap-and-invest programme.

California regulator ARB has proposed rules to fund and implement the state’s corporate climate disclosure laws, while confirming that enforcement of its financial risk reporting statute remains paused due to litigation.

Let's try this again - The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) revised Tuesday its publishing schedule of Commitments of Traders reports, which were initially delayed by the government shutdown from Oct. 1-Nov. 12. The agency will drop seven reports between now and the end of the year, and expects to return to a normal publishing schedule on Dec. 29.

ESG speech - The proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) filed a motion for summary judgment Tuesday in the federal case seeking to overturn a Texas law regulating proxy advisors’ ESG recommendations. The motion, filed 10 days before its first scheduled hearing, claims that the law (SB 2337) is “motivated by rank viewpoint discrimination” and only seeks to change ISS’ speech that the Texas Legislature doesn’t like – a clear violation of First Amendment rights. Defendants in the suit are the Texas Legislature and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who in September announced an investigation into proxy advisors for advancing voting recommendations that “advance radical political agendas.” ISS said in its Tuesday motion that the court should rule in its favour, given that “there is no set of facts under which defendants can win this case.” Meanwhile, the law has been temporarily blocked by the US district judge overseeing the case.

If there’s one overarching takeaway from Brazil’s COP30 climate summit, it’s that it was a particularly strange and messy one, reflecting the challenges of negotiating real, immediate efforts to fulfil the Paris Agreement – and the pressing need to change how the annual talks are run. 

Environmental NGOs have responded positively to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s request for ministers to present within 60 days a roadmap to move away from fossil fuels, while expressing concern about new plans for oil exploitation.

Canada has released a discussion paper launching consultations on planned amendments to the Clean Fuel Regulations (CFR), outlining how Ottawa may use domestic content requirements or credit multipliers to counter mounting trade and competitiveness pressures on Canada’s biofuel sector.

Brazil's national development bank has approved R$384.3 million ($70.3 mln) in support for a carbon capture and storage (CCS) project on a corn ethanol production site.

Latin eyes on REDD+ – Representatives from Latin American and Caribbean countries that participate in the REDD+ mechanism are meeting in Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil, from 9-12 Dec. The meeting is organised by the UNFCCC Secretariat and hosted by the Brazilian National Institute for Space Research (INPE). The event aims to strengthen knowledge-sharing among specialists, with discussions on national strategies, Forest Reference Levels (FRLs/FRELs), safeguards information systems and the interaction between REDD+ and Article 6 of the Paris Agreement. Increasing transparency for results-based finance, such as from the Green Climate Fund, and enhancing future collaboration among Parties is also under discussion, according to Brazil’s Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change (MMA).

A US-based marine carbon removal (mCDR) company signed a prepurchase agreement with a tech giant, the project developer announced Wednesday.

A new analysis has found that legally-binding climate commitments have led to a “substantial increase” in the share of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) holdings in mutual funds – the first study to provide empirical evidence of climate finance being mobilised by climate laws.

California's Legislature could face difficult choices as previous commitments exceed available Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) revenues by over $1.8 billion, according to a report published Monday.

The California cap-and-trade programme, formally renamed cap-and-invest by lawmakers, requires careful implementation to prevent putting undue pressure on consumers, according to a state report published on Tuesday.

A new report by a Canadian think tank suggests Canada’s push to deploy LNG could be leveraged for international emissions credits, but another warned the country's emergent gas-producing province should be cautious of using all of its renewable energy generation towards new terminals. 

Colombia’s Congress on Tuesday voted to shelve a fiscal reform bill that sought to raise government revenues for 2026 and included significant amendments to the national carbon tax and its offsetting mechanism, with officials signalling that the administration may pursue alternative legal avenues – including a potential economic emergency – to legislate by decree.

Electrical distribution utilities under California’s cap-and-invest programme are set to receive over 1 million more no-cost allowances in 2026 relative to the year prior, the only sector to see a seven-figure-boost, according to data released by state regulator ARB on Tuesday.

The voluntary carbon market (VCM) operates more like a differentiated, over-the-counter (OTC) marketplace for "emotionally-appealing marketing claims" than a unified commodity market, according to a new study that draws on data from one of the largest offset dealers globally.

Not a curve – Bolivia’s latest climate submission underscores the country’s continued failure to curb deforestation, despite commitments set out in its updated NDC, negotiators told local media La Region. While the government claims progress across several sectors, primary forest loss has surged to 1.48 million ha in 2024 – the world’s second-highest total – with officials acknowledging that targets to cut deforestation have instead reversed. Experts warned the country lacks financing, monitoring systems, and political willingness to halt forest clearing.

Ten of the world’s largest oil and gas companies would generate substantially greater shareholder value by stopping exploration and sharply curtailing new upstream development, according to an analysis released Wednesday.