Co-Founder and Director of Carbon Projects at Cool Effect, Dee Lawrence is backed by decades of experience in the carbon credit industry.
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We can all agree that climate change is a major problem facing the planet and its people. But there’s lots of disagreement over how best to tackle the problem presented by our rapidly warming planet. Climate change is a multifaceted issue, and its solutions are just as complex as the problem itself. But come on, folks! It’s time to stop disagreeing over what’s the best solution and admit that we need everything.
It’s no secret that in the field of environmental action, there are myriad solutions on the table—from carbon capture technology to clean energy initiatives, from reforestation efforts to mitigation with high-quality carbon credit projects, and more—and every single one of these solutions is touted as important by its advocates. With so many backing their particular solution, prioritizing can feel like people are taking hundreds of different sides, but in reality, we’re all taking one side: Earth’s.
We need urgent climate action, and we need it now. We need urgent climate solutions, and we need them now. All of them. There’s no time to wait or to debate which solution is ideal because quite honestly, uncertainty is inherent in climate mitigation and we may not know what is the “best” solution for decades to come. Last year was the hottest one on record, and 2024 shows no signs of slowing down. As of right now, we have around 29 months to limit global temperature rise this century to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. Earth’s oceans have set a new high-temperature record every single day for over a year now. Our shared focus should be on activating the tools that we have available to address these problems now, not sacrificing the good for the perfect—especially because when it comes to climate change, the perfect solution doesn’t exist. We don’t need “this or that” arguments; we need “this and that” solutions.
Carbon credits are a solution, and as their popularity grows (a record 164 million credits were retired in 2023), scrutiny surrounding both their creation and use has grown as well. Some of the scrutiny was deserved; some not so much. The important thing is to know that there is a well-coordinated effort to improve carbon credit quality and transparency underway.
Groups like the Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market (ICVCM) have been diligently working behind the scenes on initiatives designed to increase the integrity and transparency of, as well as trust in, the voluntary carbon market as a whole, and they’re not doing it alone. (Disclosure: I am a member of the board and the Standards Oversight Committee for the ICVCM.)
The ICVCM’s Core Carbon Principles (CCPs) were developed with the help and input of hundreds of businesses, academics, researchers and project developers who understand the need for a strong, reliable carbon market that business leaders can place their trust in. The CCPs are 10 "science-based principles for identifying high-quality carbon credits that create real, verifiable climate impact,” but when it comes to evaluating the integrity of carbon credits, they’re more than just boxes to check. These principles represent an industry-wide benchmark for quality for both the entities that issue carbon credits and the methodologies they use that make it easy for buyers to understand the integrity of a carbon credit. The CCPs form the foundation of the ICVCM’s assessment framework, which outlines the criteria used to assess whether a credit meets the high threshold of quality, integrity, science and impact needed to adhere to the CCPs.
We need all the help we can get to finance climate change mitigation, especially from the private sector. All programs that advocate for continuous improvement like these are so important because the science of mitigation is constantly evolving. High-quality carbon projects, delivering high-quality carbon credits and endorsed by rigorous frameworks like the CCPs, can power much-needed climate action with much-needed finance from the private sector.
If you’re in a position with decision-making power about your organization’s environmental initiatives, I encourage you to take verifiable action now to decarbonize and to use high-quality carbon credits for emissions that can’t be reduced in any other way. The time for fighting about solutions is over. The time for making an impact with actionable, verifiable solutions is right now.
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