Well-designed voluntary carbon markets can be an important avenue to de-risk the private capital needed for the energy transition in developing countries. For this reason, the Bezos Earth Fund, in partnership with the U.S. Department of State and The Rockefeller Foundation, has created the Energy Transition Accelerator (ETA). The ETA seeks to create a transparent and inclusive process to deliver high integrity emission reductions that count towards ambitious climate targets. I recently joined Emiliya Mychasuk of the Financial Times to talk about this work. You can read our conversation in the FT here ➡️ https://on.ft.com/42NF5nN.
Insightful interview Andrew thank you for sharing. Critically you underline the link between carbon markets, particularly voluntary carbon markets, and our climate objectives. When we started building carbon markets in the late 1990s and early 2000s under the Kyoto Protocol it was understood that these were tools to deliver prescribed outcomes. Whilst not always clearly communicated the VCM is intended to deliver critical finance for the carbon removals the science and carbon budgets show we need I love the way you articulates how finance can also flow through carbon credit mechanisms to incentivize the energy transition in the developing and emerging world. If carbon markets and in particular the voluntary carbon markets are to live up to their full potential as part of the toolbox to deliver the net zero transition it is imperative the link to outcomes is firmly established and clearly articulated as you have done. Otherwise, the VCM and the carbon credits it creates will, unfairly or not, continue to be seen as a modern form of purchasing indulgences. Holding back the development of one of the critical tools we so desperately need drive us to a net zero nature positive world.
Great interview and excelent points!!!
Hello Andrew - Totally agree - however - the first thing which is needed is a means to generate electricity at Zero emissions -- secondy that is is low cost easy mass manufacture - does not need ton of rare earths and great if it produces its own fuel on demand from the engine. Govt Funding -- does not match their version of Green Hydrogen The concept crosses of fields where Zero emissions energy should be used - Batteriesand H2 FCs not usable in 60% of countries. Please feel free to raise some questions
Ken Coulson
2y
Good stuff Andrew Steer but it would be great to see partnerships like this address design flaws. For instance: - A market called 'voluntary' will never scale and one only needs to look at the price action to understand this. Voluntary markets are not recession-proof, they will disappear in hard times. A solution: = make Carbon Asset Markets mandatory by linking them to ETS and making participation at a growing threshold of emission a prerequisite for an ESG rating, otherwise - Assets will continue to trade way underwater vs. liabilities meaning negative stakeholder equity. In the corporate world, this means bankruptcy, in the real world its far worse. - stop the nonsense that nature is less durable and permanent than tech solutions. On the grid level, nature is the only self-perpetuating solution that delivers required (for life) co-benefits of health soils, water tables, and biodiversity. Nature already delivered a multi-billion year equilibrium and resource stock. It is silly to challenge its permanence or assume that on a theoretical basis it should trade less than tech-based solutions (that would imply negative value for biodiversity, water tables etc ...) Future Bright
Great Insightful
Dear Andrew S., I am T/giorgis G., a lecturer at one of public universities in Ethiopia, East Africa. I have something that i desperately want to tell you about. Would you please help me reach out to you? Regards,
Van Xuan Anh
2y
you are so true, Andrew Steer: Take the Vietnam example. Demand for electricity is rising by 8 per cent every year — that’s a huge amount of extra electricity to generate. They know how to do it because they’ve been building coal power plants and gas power plants for a long time. And they do it very, very well. But, if they want to switch [from coal and gas power plants], to stop building them — apart from the ones currently under construction — they have said ‘we need some financial help’. They will need to invest very heavily, for example, in offshore wind.
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Sebastian Kind