You may have heard of a recent greenwashing trend whereby fossil fuel majors are marketing their polluting products as “carbon neutral”. In 2021 alone, companies have claimed 19 massive fossil fuel cargoes to be “carbon neutral” on the basis that the associated oil and gas companies have retired carbon credits to compensate for fossil emissions. What’s more, oil and gas companies are pushing the myth that carbon capture and storage can make fossil fuels “carbon-free”.
There are SO many problems with such claims that ECO does not even know where to begin but suffice it to say that, no matter how much fossil fuel companies and countries try, they cannot offset their way to 1.5˙C. That’s why, despite the number of net zero emissions pledges trumpeted at COP26 and repeated promises that Article 6 is going to deliver on ambition, ECO remains dubious.
Let’s be clear: the surest way to avoid truly catastrophic levels of warming is to cut emissions at the source, in line with science and equity, by immediately halting expansion of oil, gas, and coal, phasing out their production and consumption, reducing agricultural emissions and ending deforestation. Staying below 1.5°C requires bringing fossil fuel emissions and deforestation down to zero–real zero–not “balancing” them out with carbon credits or illusory technologies in the pursuit of a theoretical “net” zero.
Countries in the Global North need to move first and fastest to slash their emissions domestically, without reliance on offsets or carbon markets riddled with loopholes.
If Article 6 allows countries to meet their mitigation obligations and commitments not by primarily exhausting all available measures to cut emissions domestically, but through the purchase of climate measures elsewhere, ambition will remain a pipe dream.
The UK Presidency says this COP is about getting on the path to 1.5°C (and the world is nowhere near on track),and is pressuring countries to conclude negotiations on Article 6. Requirements: Absolutely NO double counting of credits whether inside or outside an NDC (this includes having measures in place so that corresponding adjustments can be applied for CORSIA and the voluntary carbon market); NO carry-over of credits from the CDM whatsoever; robust baselines set below business as usual; and high “overall mitigation in global emissions” (OMGE) through automatic partial cancellation of credits. Without those elements, Article 6 will blow a hole in the Paris Agreement too big for a net to cover it.
“Netting” out fossil fuels doesn’t keep us to 1.5˙C, reductions do.