A non-profit focused on ocean-based decarbonisation published a resource on the responsible development and scale-up of seaweed-based products that could reduce GHG emissions across multiple sectors.

VCS revamp complete - Verra has completed the operationalisation of its VCS Version 5 with the release of updated versions of various templates, it announced on Tuesday. This means that all project proponents can begin using the new version, Verra added. In addition to project description, monitoring report, and validation/verification report templates, the new releases include other new templates and documents related to environmental and social safeguards. The updated templates must be used for all project requests submitted after Jan. 1, 2027, including projects with audits that are already underway, Verra noted. If project proponents anticipate that their initial registration request, verification approval request, or crediting period renewal request will be submitted after this deadline, both project proponents and VVBs must transition to the use of the new templates. The voluntary standard said it will host training sessions on all VCS Version 5 updates, including how to use the new templates, later in 2026.

Farm to Washington’s table - US Senator Edward Markey (D) and Representatives Andrew Garbarino (D) and Chrissy Houlahan (D) reintroduced the Natural Climate Solutions Research and Extension Act on Tuesday, to include natural climate solutions as a high-priority research and extension initiative for the US Department of Agriculture (USDA). It would ensure that competitive specialised research and extension grants made by the USDA extends to natural climate solutions like wetland restoration, reforestation, cover crop planting, or rotational grazing, helping to lower emissions.

Nuclear know-how – Constellation Energy’s Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania is moving closer to coming back online, according to a waiver granted by the US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). That document grants the company to transfer grid interconnection rights from its separate, Eddystone gas power station to the former Three Mile Island Unit 1, which will be redeveloped as the Crane Clean Energy Center. Constellation said the project remains on track for a 2027 restart.

Methane match - Non-profit Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) has filed a lawsuit challenging the US EPA's weakening of methane regulations for the oil and gas sector known as OOOOb/c. The EPA and a dozen other groups have also challenged the EPA's earlier delay of methane regulations, and they filed their brief that case earlier this week.

Must be coal – US Energy Secretary Chris Wright last week issued an emergency order to keep coal generation online in Florida in order to address critical grid reliability issues. Wright directed municipal utility Orlando Utilities Commission (OUC) to keep Unit 1 of its Stanton Energy Center, a 465-MW coal-fired unit, available to operate despite its planned June shutdown. The order is in effect through Sep. 1. The federal agency cited the North American Electric Reliability Corporation’s 2025 Long-Term Reliability Assessment for Florida, which forecast an escalated demand in power from new data centres and other sources while transmission growth lags behind. The OUC had planned to place the plan in “cold shutdown”, planning to replace Unit 1 with a peaking plant and to convert the 465-MW Unit 2 to gas by the end of 2027. The DOE has issued five other similar 90-day orders to extend the operation of coal-fired power plants.

Credit crunch - A federal court ruling vacating IRS guidance for wind and solar tax credits is expected to have limited near-term impact on project development, as renewable energy developers are already racing to begin construction before a July 4 safe harbour deadline under the Republican One Big Beautiful Bill Act, E&E News reported. Developers that meet the deadline can qualify for investment and production tax credits being phased out, while projects that miss it must be in operation by the end of 2027 to qualify. Lawyers and analysts said the ruling’s timing, and the possibility of appeal, mean it is unlikely to materially change market behaviour in the coming weeks.

Rivaling revival - The US Supreme Court on Monday revived a gas industry challenge to Biden-era DOE efficiency regulations, granting the American Gas Association’s petition, vacating a lower court ruling, and sending the case back to the DC Circuit. The order directs the appeals court to reconsider the case in light of the position taken by the US Solicitor General in an Apr. 28 brief, giving the industry another opportunity to contest the rules after the lower court ruling.

Stand up for solar & wind - Four Democratic US senators push for appropriators to place guardrails on the Trump administration’s enhanced scrutiny of renewable energy projects. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (NV) shared a new letter with reporters that the group sent to the Republican and Democratic leadership of the relevant subcommittees on the Senate Committee on Appropriations to ensure federal agencies permit energy projects fairly. Currently, solar and wind projects must receive personal approval from the Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum. While a federal court ruled against that policy directive, the Trump administration had promised to fight the decision. The Democrats from the Energy and Natural Resources Committee also want their colleagues in charge of appropriations to act against a separate Trump administration policy to consider a project’s “capacity density”, weighing a project’s footprint relative to the amount of energy produced. (E&E News)

Increasing CO2 capture efficiency -  Developer AnorTech announced a one-year collaboration with the National Research Council of Canada on Monday to research the development of alumina-based catalysts for CO2 capture. The project would build on 2025 testing of AnorTech’s sustainable alumina (Al2O3) used to capture CO2 and convert it into methane via hydrogenation. The material is developed from anorthosite, a rare, igneous rock also used in fiberglass and ceramics, which AnorTech produces from a site in Greenland.

Not so wonderful - Robert Davies, a Utah State University physicist and complex systems scientist, has dubbed the Alberta’s C$70 bln ($50 bln) Wonder Valley AI data centre and 9 GW power plant a “Gigascale AI smelter" in a preliminary technical assessment prepared for legal counsel of the Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation. Davies said the project – backed by celebrity investor Kevin O’Leary and exempt from environmental impact assessment by the province – would emit “something like” 50 MtCO2e per year, or about 7% of Canada's annual emissions. The project would also be one of the largest single-site heat sources on the planet, generating 16-18 GW of continuous heat.

No Quebec natural gas - Quebec’s Advisory Committee on Climate Change has recommended the province prohibit new natural gas connections in a report aimed at decarbonising its building sector, according to CityNews Montreal. The recommendation is a part of the ninth opinion of the committee. It also looked to carbon ratings, dynamic electricity pricing, and reduce energy demand from the building stock.

Carbon projects, pricing, and trading appeared in a new place on Tuesday: among the proposals to align public and private finance flows with low-emission development, as discussed in a first dialogue on the Paris Agreement goal. 

Migration milestone – A spokesperson for Winrock International confirmed to Carbon Pulse on Tuesday that the migration of both the ACR and Architecture for REDD+ Transactions (ART) to ICE GreenTrace has been completed, transferring approximately 437.8 mln serialised carbon credits and more than 40,000 documents from 1,162 projects and programmes to 857 Registry Account Holders from issuance to retirement. The transition moved over 25 years of emissions reduction and removals data across 857 registry account holders in what was described as one of the most complex registry migrations undertaken in the carbon market.

Mexican carbon project developers are increasingly preparing for a future in which domestic climate goals and the country’s emissions trading system (ETS) take precedence over international carbon credit exports, following fresh signals from the government that authorisations for overseas use may not be a near-term priority.

An initiative aimed at supporting Tribal Nations in the US navigate the growing carbon removal (CDR) landscape launched on Tuesday three guides for ensuring decision-making around the sector reflects Tribal priorities and goals.

California’s proposed carbon capture, utilisation, and storage (CCUS) and removal (CDR) regulations have drawn competing calls for broader project eligibility, tighter definitions, stronger community safeguards, and lighter-touch treatment of federally regulated geologic storage, according to public comments submitted to state regulator ARB.

About 60% of sustainability teams would like to ramp up their use of artificial intelligence in the coming year, with accuracy concerns posing a more significant deterrent than the environmental impacts of increased demand for water and energy, according to a report published on Tuesday.

US-based standard body Climate Action Reserve (CAR) is seeking feedback on a proposed update to set a standard permanence commitment period of 40 years.

PAC priorities - Green political action committee (PAC) LCV Victory Fund - an arm of the League of Conservation Voters - published a memo on Monday prioritising appealing to voters concerned about rising energy costs in midterm elections in the US this fall. In the PAC's view, clean energy is a popular solution to these concerns, and Democratic victories in elections last year in New Jersey and Virginia are evidence of that.

Virginia wind win - Construction is now underway at the Rocky Forge Wind in Virginia as government officials, community boosters, and project developer Apex Clean Energy gathered on Saturday to celebrate the beginning of the process for erecting 13 wind turbines and mounting blades on them, reported local outlet WVTF. The project has faced years of local opposition and lawsuits, but Apex now expects to finish construction of the wind farm and begin producing energy by the end of the year.

Canada's forests are being pushed towards becoming a net carbon source as wildfire activity intensifies, according to a recent study.

Google will target emissions from employee business travel with a new agreement for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) certificates (SAFc), touted as the largest publicly announced SAFc deal between an airline and a single corporate customer to date.

Researchers, environmental organisations, and carbon market experts are urging the industry to look beyond traditional buffer pools and adopt a wider range of tools to ensure the long-term durability of nature-based carbon credits – using a new "unified framework".

The incoming presidency of COP31 has proposed a global target to increase the share of energy demand met by electricity to 35% by 2035, positioning electrification as a cornerstone of efforts to reduce emissions and accelerate the transition away from fossil fuels.

A Japanese corporate giant is seeking more partners to pioneer direct ocean capture (DOC), after announcing it was developing a pilot plant following two years of research by an institute in Finland.

Negotiators at the SB64 climate summit in Bonn are transitioning the Kyoto-era Adaptation Fund (AF) to Paris, with UN carbon markets historically contributing large sums to the fund – but financing from the Paris Agreement Crediting Mechanism (PACM) is still on standby.

Forestry-based carbon projects that are government-led and factored into national accounting systems can achieve landscape-scale change, with credit prices trading at a premium, say experts.

The UN’s Technical Expert Reviews (TERs) of Article 6.2 initial reports are fully within bounds, and are not erroneously applying Paris Agreement Crediting Mechanism (PACM) norms, a senior member of the UNFCCC has said.

Global data shows early signs that ecosystem restoration rates could exceed those of deforestation, according to the founding chair of the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, who is optimistic this milestone could be reached within 30 years.

Carbon credit issuances and retirements bounced up in May year-on-year across the voluntary carbon market while benchmark CORSIA prices fell 22% to end the month around $10/tonne, their lowest level since June 2024.

A US climate platform is seeking more than 100,000 carbon removals (CDR) and super pollutant mitigation credits, with a particular focus on projects in Southeast Asia, Latin America, and island nations, it announced.

The Brazilian COP30 presidency’s deforestation roadmap, presented in an early form on Monday, has been well received by a coalition of the willing, while the endeavour to draft a fossil fuel transition plan has sparked some backlash, Carbon Pulse heard in Bonn.

California oil - The Trump administration is in active talks to create a petroleum reserve in California, Politico reported Friday. That’s according to a document authored by lawyers of Sable Offshore, a company that owns oil platforms off the state’s coast, which was sent to the US DOE. The company has proposed a West Coast Strategic Petroleum Reserve to bolster supplies, though it is expected to draw opposition from California lawmakers.

Academic economics researchers published a working paper illustrating the impacts of carbon tariffs and domestic taxes, creating a model that disproves the trade-off between global emissions reductions and US GDP.