Airlines, oil companies, and individuals are using voluntary carbon markets to achieve net reductions in greenhouse gas emissions at levels not seen in seven years, according to Financing Emissions Reductions for the Future: State of the Voluntary Carbon Markets 2019, which was published by Forest Trends’ Ecosystem Marketplace initiative at year-end climate talks (COP25) in Madrid, Spain. Companies feel an urgency to reduce their emissions, but they can’t eliminate them internally overnight. Many are now using voluntary carbon markets to offset those emissions they can’t eliminate until they can transition to new technologies. This is the 12th edition of the report, which Ecosystem Marketplace first began publishing in 2007. It draws on extensive market data gathered from the years 2017 and 2018, coupled with interviews to interpret findings and identify trends in the current calendar year.
[2]