Independent due diligence on jurisdictional claims will be increasingly necessary for generating buyer-facing confidence in jurisdictional REDD+ (J-REDD+) programmes, speakers said during an online event on Thursday.

Regulatory oversight should be viewed as an enabling condition to scale up carbon credit markets, according to new research.

A US-based developer of super pollutant credits is targeting rapid expansion into Central and South America as food supply chains increasingly shift into the region, according to its CEO.  

Getting personal - All Nippon Airways (ANA) has launched a Personal Program under its Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) Flight Initiative, allowing individual travellers to contribute to SAF use when booking flights. The airline said it is the first Japanese carrier to offer such a programme to retail customers. Through an online platform, travellers can enter their flight details, view estimated CO2 emissions, and purchase SAF environmental attributes linked to their journey. Participants receive a certificate showing the estimated lifecycle emissions reductions associated with their contribution. The programme was designed by ANA and is powered by Chooose, which provides emissions calculations, SAF attribute tracking, and auditability systems. ANA said the initiative aims to broaden participation in aviation decarbonisation by giving leisure travellers a transparent way to support SAF deployment.

China repeatedly criticises the European Union's carbon border tariff as a unilateral trade measure, but a more pragmatic response is forming behind the scenes, according to a new report that said Beijing is aligning its own carbon architecture with European standards to protect exporters.

Solar green light – The Glorit solar farm has reached financial close and construction of the 171 MWdc installation will now begin, New Zealand gentailer Contact Energy announced on Thursday. Developed in partnership with Lightsource bp, the project secured NZ$285 mln ($165.2 mln) of non-recourse financing from ANZ, Mizuho, Bank of China New Zealand, China Construction Bank New Zealand, Deutsche Zentral-Genossenschafts Bank. The partners have decided to extend their collaboration to other opportunities, Contact added. New Zealand’s power sector is covered by the country’s ETS, despite being dominated by renewables.

The carbon industry still faces a critical financing bottleneck as traditional lenders remain sidelined by a lack of bankable offtake agreements, despite growing support for early-stage projects, a conference heard Thursday.

As promises to tackle emissions in the short term butt heads with the realities of rising energy demand and pricey, early-stage carbon removal technologies, companies are increasingly looking for faster, easier wins – and driving a new market for superpollutant credits.

Upskilling - A new partnership announced on Wednesday between the government of Western Australia and fertiliser player Yara Pilbara aims to upskill workers in the Pilbara region for clean energy jobs. Yara Pilbara operates one of the state’s largest ammonia production facilities and is also developing a renewable hydrogen plant, positioning the region as a key part of Western Australia’s future as a “renewable energy powerhouse”. Upskilling initiatives will prioritise the participation of Aboriginal people and women.

A German-headquartered foundation opened a call for proposals this week, offering a total $17 million of funding to projects focused on establishing blue carbon schemes in marine protected areas, and Other Effective area-based Conservation Measures (OECMs) across four Asian countries.

Guidance - Regulators in Taiwan are developing new anti-greenwashing guidelines, which are expected to be finalised by the end of the year. The environment ministry and the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) have begun consultations to establish Scope 3 emission factors. The government will prioritise setting these standards for semiconductor and electronic component manufacturing industries, given their high export volumes and importance to the global supply chain.

The CEO of a legacy REDD+ project in Indonesia has said overseas buyers and investors are looking for stability in the country’s carbon regulatory landscape to instil confidence that credits will resume and remain flowing.

Formula 1, the top tier of international motorsport, has reduced its carbon footprint by 35% from its 2018 baseline and remains on track to becoming a net zero sport by 2030, according to its latest sustainability report.

Green voyage -  Japanese shipping giant Mitsui O.S.K. Lines has signed new agreements with Dutch LNG supplier Titan and Swiss energy trader Axpo to expand the supply of bio-LNG fuel for its car carriers across Northern Europe and the Mediterranean. The move extends MOL's bio-LNG bunkering network to Spanish ports, including Malaga and Barcelona, building on an existing Northwest Europe arrangement, it said. MOL estimated that replacing one tonne of conventional fuel oil with bio-LNG avoids around 4.5 tCO2.

Demand for Australian carbon credits is likely to continue rising until around 2043, several years later than other forecasts have suggested, according to a market advisory that claimed industrial facilities covered under the Safeguard Mechanism may take longer than expected to decarbonise.

The announcement states that trading will be suspended until the exchange is satisfied that NoviqTech is in compliance with its listing rules, specifically Listing Rule 3.1 on timeline disclosure of information that may materially affect share value.

A major Japanese shipping company said it is waiting on the passage of key regulations, including the Net Zero-Framework, before it ramps up purchases of carbon removal (CDR) credits.

Governments across East Asia are ramping up reforms to their emissions trading schemes, though the strength of their policy signals varies widely.

Asia-Pacific industry is beginning to explore how carbon market‑style accounting can support the emissions assurance now demanded under the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), even as regional readiness remains highly uneven.

The New South Wales Net Zero Commission (NZC) has issued a call for evidence to better understand the opportunities and barriers to decarbonisation in the state.

Monitoring template – India's Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE) has released a monitoring plan template for entities covered under the country's Carbon Credit Trading Scheme (CCTS), setting out detailed requirements for tracking and reporting GHG emissions. The template requires obligated entities to document emission sources, source streams, monitoring methodologies, measurement equipment, sampling and calibration procedures, and internal controls for emissions data management.

A coalition of Iwi leaders, climate activists, and an environmental non-profit have lodged a complaint with the UN’s human rights and climate change rapporteur over a New Zealand government proposal to restrict climate-related tort claims.

Uninsured – New Zealand’s listed health and life insurers will no longer be obliged to submit annual climate risk reports, the government announced on Thursday. This will reduce the number of companies covered by the mandatory disclosure scheme by nine, to 67 – significantly below the 164 the regime started with. The Financial Markets Authority said it would provide interim relief to health and life insurance companies by taking no action to enforce the regulation while waiting for the legislative change to be passed. The government last year proposed weakening the climate disclosure scheme, lifting the threshold for reporting from a market capitalisation of NZ$60 mln ($34.8 mln) to NZ$1 bln, which knocked out 88 companies. The Financial Markets Conduct Amendment Bill, which will enshrine all of the above changes, is yet to be passed.

Ammonia shipping – JERA, Japan’s largest power generator, has entered into time charter agreements with Japanese shipping conglomerates Mitsui OSK Lines and NYK Bulkship Asia for two fuel carriers each to transport low-carbon ammonia, it announced Thursday. Ammonia produced at the Blue Point Project in Louisiana, US will be supplied to JERA’s Hekinan Thermal Power Station. The contracts mark the world’s first long-term deployment of Very Large Gas Carriers for low-carbon ammonia transportation, JERA said.

Small island developing states (SIDS) want the Bonn climate talks to move mitigation finance and Article 6 support beyond discussions and towards practical access to concessional capital, project preparation support, and implementation pathways needed to meet finance-dependent climate targets, experts told Carbon Pulse.