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TOP STORY
EXCLUSIVE – Developers Assemble: EcoSecurities alumni regroup to relaunch iconic offset firm for new era of carbon markets
EcoSecurities, one of the most iconic developers of the offset project boom of the 2000s, is being relaunched by a team of its alumni and co-founders, Carbon Pulse has learned, who are gearing up to trailblaze once again in a new era of international carbon markets.
VOLUNTARY
INTERVIEW: Shell witnessing “wind of change” in voluntary carbon market
Shell expects a surge in demand for voluntary carbon credits after witnessing an immediate uptake from customers when it launched its own programmes, according the oil major’s executive tasked with making good on the company’s three-year $300 million nature commitment.
ASIA PACIFIC
New Zealand adopts zero carbon legislation
New Zealand on Thursday adopted legislation that obligates it to cut biological methane emissions 24-47% below 2017 levels by mid-century and slash all other greenhouse gases to zero by 2050.
Korean ETS firms bank 35.5 mln KAU18s into 2019
Participants in South Korea’s emissions trading scheme have banked 35.5 million 2018 vintage carbon allowances into 2019, the government said Thursday, some 6% of total annual allocation.
EMEA
Nine EU finance ministers urge Brussels to move on taxing airline emissions
Finance ministers from nine EU nations are calling on the incoming European Commission to ease the path for their countries to impose taxes on flight emissions.
EU Market: EUAs again fail to hold above €25 as German economy falters
EUAs failed to hold above €25 for the second straight session on Thursday, but kept near that mark despite another weak auction and further bearish German economic data.
AMERICAS
NA Markets: Virginia election spurs RGGI to five-month high, CCAs inch up on emissions data
RGGI allowance (RGA) prices rose to a five-month high this week as market participants reacted positively to Democrats sweeping the Virginia legislature, while California Carbon Allowances (CCAs) rose slightly following the linked WCI programme’s publication of 2018 emissions data.
Oregon Clean Fuels Program bounces back with Q2 credit surplus
The Oregon Clean Fuels Program (OCFP) recorded a nearly 15,000 credit surplus during the second quarter of 2019 after posting its largest-ever deficit over the previous three months, state data showed Wednesday.
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BITE-SIZED UPDATES FROM AROUND THE WORLD
Climate finance fall – Investment in emission reductions fell 11% last year, and the benefits of outlays were cancelled out by investments globally in fossil fuels and other dirty industries, according to researchers Climate Policy Initiative in their Global Landscape of Climate Finance 2019 report. It found global climate finance hit a record high of $612 billion in 2017, but slipped to $546 bln in 2018 due to less public money for low-carbon transport and lower private-sector investment in renewable energy. (The Guardian)
Brussels brush – EU member states have agreed preliminary text calling on their European Investment Bank to stop funding fossil fuel projects, but the deal still needs the green light from more senior diplomats, Reuters reports. Brussels is also “considering stress tests and measures to force financial firms to raise their buffers against climate-change risks”, citing comments from EU financial services chief Valdis Dombrovskis. (Reuters)
Disgruntled – Almost 30% of BHP Billiton shareholders have backed a resolution for the company to cut ties with anti-climate policy lobby groups like the Minerals Council and the Business Council of Australia. The resolution did not win, but increases pressure on the BHP board to reconsider its association with groups undermining climate policies in Australia, writes the Sydney Morning Herald.
Carbon cash – Cambodia has earned some $11 mln selling carbon credits from REDD projects since 2016, the nation’s environment minister told a conference Thursday, according to the Phnom Penh Post. Buyers of the credits include the Walt Disney Corp., and negotiations over further sales are ongoing. Cambodia last month invited Germany to buy some of its credits, but the country’s REDD history has not been unproblematic, and last year was marred by a triple murder of people patrolling a REDD project site.
Keep it going, lads – Much doubt has been cast over the future of the Australian Labor party’s future climate policies after it lost the “unlosable” election in May after having gone to the polls promising to set up a baseline-and-credit scheme for major industrial carbon emitters. Several senior party members have proposed to scale back climate ambitions in order to make the party more electable in the future for miners and other fossil fuel industry workers worried about their jobs. But an internal election review published Thursday concluded that an ambitious climate policy is a ‘bedrock’ for Labor policy and that the party must continue to strive for climate action. (AP)
Coming attractions – Nova Scotia is aiming to provide further clarity in the next month regarding its first auctions for its independent carbon market, the provincial environment ministry’s executive director of climate change Jason Hollett said during the WCI board meeting in Halifax on Thursday. The Canadian province revealed last year that it will conduct between two and four auctions in 2020 using WCI technical infrastructure, with the ETS having begun this year. Additionally, Quebec environment ministry official Jean-Yves Benoit said the WCI is developing a methodology to track the transfer of allowances and offsets between market partners California and Quebec to account for their jurisdictional GHG reduction goals. The methodology, which WCI contracted out last year to two international climate policy experts, will be released publicly in the coming months to help inform other governments that implement cap-and-trade programmes, Benoit said.
And finally… Look it up – Collins Dictionary on Thursday named “climate strike” its word of the year for 2019 following months of protests and a surge of activism to address climate change. The dictionary defines the term as “a form of protest in which people absent themselves from education or work in order to join demonstrations demanding action to counter climate change”. It added that while the word was first used in Nov. 2015 when a protest was held outside the UN climate conference in Paris, the form of protest “took off just over one year ago” with teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg, who helped it grow into a worldwide movement. (The Hill)
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