Carbon Free Boston: Offsets Technical Report

Part of a series of reports that includes: Carbon Free Boston: Summary Report; Carbon Free Boston: Social Equity Report; Carbon Free Boston: Technical Summary; Carbon Free Boston: Buildings Technical Report; Carbon Free Boston: Transportation Technical Report; Carbon Free Boston: Waste Technical Report; Carbon Free Boston: Energy Technical Report; Available at http://sites.bu.edu/cfb/OVERVIEW: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency defines offsets as a specific activity or set of activities intended to reduce GHG emissions, increase the storage of carbon, or enhance GHG removals from the atmosphere [1]. From a city perspective, they provide a mechanism to negate residual GHG emissions— those the city is unable to reduce directly—by supporting projects that avoid or sequester them outside of the city’s reporting boundary. Offsetting GHG emissions is a controversial topic for cities, as the co-benefits of the investment are typically not realized locally. For this reason, offsetting emissions is considered a last resort, a strategy option available when the city has exhausted all others. However, offsets are likely to be a necessity to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050 and promote emissions reductions in the near term. While public and private sector partners pursue the more complex systems transformation, cities can utilize offsets to support short-term and relatively cost-effective reductions in emissions. Offsets can be a relatively simple, certain, and high-impact way to support the transition to a low-carbon world. This report focuses on carbon offset certificates, more often referred to as offsets. Each offset represents a metric ton of verified carbon dioxide (CO2) or equivalent emissions that is reduced, avoided, or permanently removed from the atmosphere (“sequestered”) through an action taken by the creator of the offset. The certificates can be traded and retiring (that is, not re-selling) offsets can be a useful component of an overall voluntary emissions reduction strategy, alongside activities to lower an organization’s direct and indirect emissions. In the Global Protocol for Community-Scale Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventories (GPC), the GHG accounting system used by the City of Boston, any carbon offset certificates that the City has can be deducted from the City’s total GHG emissions.http://sites.bu.edu/cfb/files/2019/06/CFB_Offsets_Technical_Report_051619.pdfPublished versio

‘Yes-in-my-backyard’: Spatial differences in the valuation of forest services and local co-benefits for carbon markets in México

Forests provide many and large benefits, including cost-efficient climate change mitigation. However international carbon markets have not stimulated the demand for forestry offsets. Domestic market-mechanisms are emerging inmany countries and forests could be highly valued through these policies asmost of the benefits produced by forests are enjoyed locally. Here, a choice experiment explores drivers of valuation and willingness to pay for forest carbon services in voluntary markets in Mexico by comparing the valuation of citizens from four regions to test geographical preference for projects (n = 645). Findings from multinomial-logit models show valuation of forest carbon services is transferable and citizens would pay more for offsets from projects closer to their homes. Proximate forests provide a range of co-benefits to local users, including environmental services and opportunities for recreation. Factors related to valuation include sense of responsibility, previous knowledge of carbon emissions, previous visits to the sites, regional identification and the valuation of local environmental services (e.g. improvements in local air quality). Knowledge of spatial heterogeneity in valuation of the use of forest services can help to design market-based instruments by identifying highly valued areas for environmental services programs and carbon markets

Linking a U.S. Cap-and-Trade System for Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Opportunities, Implications, and Challenges

The long-run cost of a U.S. cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions could be significantly reduced by linking that system with other existing and emerging tradable permit systems for GHG emissions. However, along with the cost savings that it offers, linking carries with it other implications. For example, linking has distributional consequences and, under some circumstances, linked systems collectively will not achieve the same level of emission reductions as they would absent linking. Also, linking can reduce a government's control over the impacts of its tradable permit system. Thus, in considering linkages, the United States and potential linking partners may have to weigh linking's implications for potentially competing policy objectives, much as will be required in developing other elements of their respective domestic climate policies. Because linking's implications depend on the type of link that is established and the specific characteristics and design of the linked systems, in the near-term, some links will be more attractive and easier to establish than others. Importantly, those links that may be the easiest to establish - links with emission reduction credit systems such as the Clean Development Mechanism - likely can provide much of the near-term cost-saving and risk-diversifying advantages that linking can offer. Given the implications of links with other cap-and-trade systems, to facilitate such links, it may be necessary to harmonize certain elements of the design of the U.S. system and any system(s) with which it links. In particular, agreement on a unified set of measures to address cost uncertainty likely will be a necessary pre-condition for an unrestricted link with another cap-and-trade system. Also, in order to link with other cap-and-trade systems, it may be necessary to establish broader international agreements governing aspects of the design of the U.S. and linked systems beyond simply mutual recognition of allowances.