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Thank you for helping us reach 100 million metric tons of GHG emissions reductions!
North American climate action shows its strength and impact with milestone 100 million offset credits issued by a California carbon market pioneer
In less than 10 years, the Climate Action Reserve and its account holders reduce the equivalent of over 239 billion miles driven
LOS ANGELES, CA – The Climate Action Reserve, North America’s premier carbon offset registry, announced the achievement of a major milestone for the carbon market. Together with project developers, verifiers and market participants, the organization has issued over 100 million offset credits since its inception in 2007. The announcement coincides with the kick off of the UNFCCC climate change conference, COP 23, as the world looks at how the emissions reduction goals under the Paris Agreement will be reached and how non-federal climate action in the U.S. can contribute.
Carbon offset projects are a cost-effective way to reduce emissions, while also allowing non-regulated sectors of the economy to participate in the carbon market. Offset projects such as methane capture from landfills or coal mines, destruction of ozone-depleting substances, and forest management have allowed a variety of industries and sectors of our economy to benefit from the market.
“The collective work completed by the Climate Action Reserve and its account holders has been instrumental in establishing offsets as an impactful tool for addressing climate change, especially considering their work started during a time when the concept of offsets was not fully embraced,” said Linda Adams, Chair of the Climate Action Reserve Board of Directors.
The journey to 100 million offset credits began with the van Eck Forest project and the Garcia River Forest project, which were the first and second projects, respectively, to be registered and issued credits in July 2008. Both projects illustrate the many advantages of offsets and have provided environmental and economic benefits as offset projects.
“As the first registered project under the rigorous forest protocol we helped create with CAR, we wanted the van Eck forest project to show the promise of California’s climate leadership with forest offsets. We took the risk of being first to take the mystery out of this ground-breaking approach, demonstrating both its practicality and its significant climate benefits so there would be a compelling model for others to follow. In the process, we’ve delivered both verified GHG emissions reductions and as well as substantial financial returns for the landowner and major benefits to forest health, habitats for threatened fish and wildlife, and jobs for foresters, loggers, truckers and mills,” said Laurie Wayburn, President, The Pacific Forest Trust.
“The Conservation Fund’s Garcia River Forest project was the second project registered under the Reserve’s original forest offset protocol developed and adopted in 2007. Since the initial issuance of CRTs in 2008, the Garcia project has demonstrated the ability of a rigorous and robust offset program to transform conservation and restoration of cutover forests in California. Revenue from offset sales has enabled the Fund to slow harvest levels, restore timber stands and accelerate watershed restoration over a third of the Garcia River watershed. The project has garnered attention for the varied environmental and economic benefits it provides and it has served as a proof of concept for forest owners and managers around the country and around the world. The Fund is proud to have worked with the Reserve to establish the foundation for California’s pathbreaking efforts to enlist forests in the fight against climate change,” said Chris Kelly, California State Director, The Conservation Fund.
The van Eck Forest and Garcia River Forest projects were the first offset projects in a long line of high quality projects to register with the Reserve and receive offset credits. In reaching the milestone of 100 million offset credits issued, the Reserve registered 399 projects in forestry, livestock, landfill, mine methane, nitric acid, organic waste composting, organic waste digestion, and ozone depleting substances. These projects were located in 43 U.S. states, with the most projects (52) and the most credits issued (22.5 million) in California.
What does 100 million offset credits mean? It’s equivalent to removing over 21 million passenger vehicles driven for one year, avoiding over 240 billion miles driven by an average passenger vehicle or CO2 emissions from over 11 billion gallons of gasoline consumed. It’s also equivalent to avoiding over 106 billion pounds of coal burned, over 14 million homes’ electricity use for one year or over 231 million barrels of oil consumed.
The Reserve has a long, proud history of supporting California’s climate leadership and pioneering climate initiatives to help the state and global community address climate change. The organization’s ties to California date back to 2001 when it was created by state mandate to assist with and promote voluntary emission management and reduction. Over the years, the Reserve has been honored to collaborate with other market participants and supporters to promote offsets as an impactful, economic tool to address climate change. The work has ranged from setting rigorous, transparent standards for how offset project emission reductions are calculated to supporting the continuation of a strong cap-and-trade program in California.
“This milestone underscores the climate impact of offsets, the carbon market’s support of this tool and the opportunity offsets create for different sectors to address climate change. We are honored to have worked with outstanding, dedicated project developers, verifiers, traders and many other market supporters to reach this milestone, and we are looking forward to continuing our work with them to achieve 200 million offset credits issued,” said Craig Ebert, President, Climate Action Reserve. “As we travel that road to 200 million credits, we will continue our work to ensure offsets are upheld to the highest standards of rigor, transparency and integrity and advocate for their integral role in compliance programs.”
New Tools to Increase Equitable Access to Carbon Markets for All Forestland Owners
Greetings from the Forestry Team!
As of this blog’s posting, the Climate Action Reserve has issued over 100,000,000 (!!) offset credits to projects developed with the purpose of eliminating dangerous greenhouse gases from our atmosphere. That’s the equivalent of taking more than 21,000,000 cars off the road for one year! Our small team of five is proud to be a part of this critical effort to combat climate change, and we continue to push ourselves every day to drive the Reserve’s mission: to develop, promote and support innovative, credible market-based climate change solutions that benefit economies, ecosystems and society.
To that end, we are excited to unveil a suite of tools and carbon accounting methodology updates geared towards increasing equitable access to the carbon market for all landowner types. As forests have historically served, and will continue to serve, as an indispensable source of carbon sequestration, our team has set our sights on opening the carbon market to medium and small land owners by lowering the cost of project development. Check out this cool video from the Oregon Forest Resources Institute for why forests are awesome.
In 2003 when our team first hunkered down with diverse stakeholders to design the first Forest Project Protocol through a public process, our goal was to create a new revenue stream for forest managers to manage their lands for highly productive, structurally diverse forests that support natural ecosystem processes. We accomplished this goal by setting rules, standards, and rigorous carbon accounting methodologies that gave forest offset projects, and the credits that resulted from these projects, market legitimacy. This means when someone buys a Reserve offset credit (Climate Reserve Tonne or CRT), he or she knows and trusts that each credit holds the highest scientific and environmental integrity and truly represents one metric ton of carbon reduced compared with business as usual activities. Furthermore, our online registry ensures that anyone interested can track each credit back to the owner and follow the publicly available accounting methodology to validate the environmental value of credits.
Based on our expertise, compliance grade standards and methodologies, the California Air Resources Board adopted our Forest Project Protocol for early action credits to jumpstart California’s cap and trade market in 2012. Since then, forests in the compliance market have helped to sequester more than 88 million[1] metric tons of CO2e, generated approximately $792,000,000[2] for project owners, and protected more than 565,000 acres of forestland in California[3] alone.
Yurok Tribe Sustainable Forest Project: First project approved under ARB’s forest protocol, registered with the Reserve. Photo credit: Yurok Tribe
On average, it is easier for land owners with large holdings (about 10,000 acres or so) to enter into the carbon market. The technically complex forest carbon inventory and verification, monitoring and reporting requirements provided market legitimacy but also proved to limit the participation of small land owners.
So, last year our team hunkered down once more and harnessed the availability of new data, new technology, and new knowledge to improve our accounting system in ways that will also lower the barrier for market participation, all while maintaining the same high degree of scientific rigor.
With a USDA NRCS Conservation Innovation Grant award, we developed the Climate Action Reserve Inventory Tool (CARIT) and a complementary Standardized Inventory Methodology to enable land owners to manage their carbon inventory in-house. This data management tool allows you to calculate and grow your forest carbon, facilitates complex analysis to support your cost/benefit projections and decision-making process, and is highly transparent, not to mention—completely free.
With your feedback, advice and support, the Forestry Team also updated the Forest Project Protocol to the newest version: 4.0. This latest version builds on our experience of working with more than 138 forest projects[4]. We identified areas for improvement and came up with solutions, clarifications, and guidance to make forest offset project development more accessible for all land owners interested in sustainably managing their forestland.
Our team will be touring northern California this fall to share information and best practices, connect foresters and forest owners to market players and help people become better informed. Please join us at a city near you to hear more about what we’ve been up to, how we can support you, and test drive these tools with us. Carbon project owners from the region will also share their experiences, market insights, and best practices. We will discuss opportunities for landowners, particularly smaller landowners, to participate in both voluntary and compliance projects. Guests will also receive a copy CARIT and the Forest Project Protocol Version 4.0. We hope to see you soon for local wines and beers, appetizers, and great company and conversation. Tour details below, and you can click here to register for an (free) event.
[1] Figure based on Climate Action Reserve and American Carbon Registry (ACR) reports on September 18th, 2017.
[2] Californiacarbon.info market reports CCO8 prices at $11.87 on September 18th, this figure multiplies the credits issued by a conservative $9.
[3] This figure applies to listed and registered forest projects located in California, includes projects registered with the Reserve and with ACR.
[4] Includes completed, listed, transitioned, registered forest projects in the Reserve’s Projects Report on September 18th, 2017
Mexico Forest Protocol Version 1.5 Now Available
Save the date for NACW 2018, April 4-6 in San Francisco
Check out our schedule of upcoming Grassland, Landfill, and General verification training courses and exams
A recording of the webinar “California extends cap-and-trade program – what it will look like post 2020” is now available.
Reserve Board adopts Forest Project Protocol Version 4.0
Tips for developing an effective climate advocacy campaign
written by Trevor Anderson
According to recently released data from the Yale Program on Climate Communication, roughly 70 percent of the American public believes that global warming is happening and that carbon emissions should be scaled back. However, the other 30 percent, including some key elected leaders, still need a little convincing. This has left many in the U.S., including myself, wanting to advocate for climate progress.
Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) Climate Corps recently hosted a Climate Advocacy Workshop for a select group of Climate Corps alumni in Austin, Texas, and I was lucky enough to attend. EDF Climate Corps is a summer fellowship program that places trained graduate students inside leading organizations to accelerate sustainable energy projects and strategy. I was a Climate Corps Fellow in downtown Los Angeles in summer 2015, working for a commercial real estate company on green building, energy efficiency, and sustainability initiatives.
At the advocacy workshop, Jared Carter of Vermont Law School detailed what it means to be a climate advocate, what others like us have done, and what actions we can take today, all while keeping our day jobs.
If you, too, want to advocate for climate progress, and may not be sure where to begin, here are some tips for developing an effective advocacy campaign:
- Identify the Issue and determine what specifically to work on
e.g., carbon offsets - Create an Entity (or find one), as it’s more effective to advocate on behalf of an organization than as an individual
e.g. Southern Californians for Local Offset Projects (SCALLOP) - Define big picture Goals and the clear, specific Objectives to move toward them
e.g., Goal: The inclusion of carbon offsets in California state and local climate policy instruments to aid California’s goal of reducing GHG emissions 40% below 1990 levels by 2030
Objective 1: Support the incorporation of carbon offsets in the California cap-and-trade program beyond 2020;
Objective 2: Produce educational materials on the positive impacts of local level offsets and distribute to Southern California communities; - Carry out a Behavior Gap Analysis and assess how best to mobilize public support
e.g., Showcase the benefits – environmental, economic, and social – of developing offset projects in local Southern Californian communities and inform the public - Identify your Primary – the people with the power to make decisions – and Secondary Audiences – supporters, opponents, and “persuadables”
e.g., Primary – Elected officials, such as State Representatives;
Secondary – Supporters, such as environmental nonprofits; Opponents, such as climate deniers; and Persuadables, such as Southern Californian residents - Conduct a Power Analysis to understand the powers and weakness of all allies and opponents
e.g., Local councilmembers have Positional Power – power by role; grassroots organizations have Collective Power – power in numbers; and nonprofits have Expert Power – power of knowledge and information - Create a visual Action Map portraying and establishing the connections amongst stakeholders
e.g., Draw a line connecting the grassroots organizations with environmental nonprofits, and write out the ways the two can work together - Build a Platform of proposed solutions and Stand on It
e.g., Offsets have proven to be a key policy mechanism that achieves numerous complementary and critical GHG policy goals, and rather than scaling back an already successful solution, the positive impacts of additional offset generation and usage should be evaluated - Develop a Strategy of concrete actions to achieve specific outcomes;
e.g., Attend town hall meetings to learn about local climate policy measures; call and/or email elected officials defending legislation for carbon offsets; etc.
and - Focus on what’s achievable in the Short-Term
e.g., open public comment periods, upcoming policy decision deadlines and/or elections, etc.
All in all, what’s most important to being an effective advocate, is the need for a positive approach with affirmative solutions.