The high hanging fruit of mitigation potential refers to the technologies and measures to decarbonise emission sources that remain otherwise entirely inaccessible to host country governments in the near- and medium-term future, on account of extraordinary costs or other insurmountable barriers that cannot reasonably be overcome. For carbon crediting mechanisms used for compliance purposes or voluntary offsetting claims, we consider that high-hanging fruit projects represent the only solution to ensure that overall climate change mitigation ambition can be enhanced rather than compromised. But climate contributions not associated with offsetting claims may be the most appropriate and constructive channel for financial support to some high-hanging fruit mitigation projects. This primer explores the relevance of the high-hanging fruit of climate change mitigation projects and the role that voluntary climate finance can play to support these projects.
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