Voluntary Carbon Markets - Developers Overview 2022

We have published our second annual report analysing the state of the carbon project developer ecosystem.

About this Report

The report intends to promote transparency around the state of the carbon project developer ecosystem and its level of maturity, helping to assess the market’s capacity to produce the volumes and integrity claims required to ensure that the market is functioning effectively. It also reveals how actively the developers contribute knowledge and skills to the expansion of this sector.

We have examined aggregate data from project developers that submit reports to the four major registries: Verra’s Verified Carbon Standard (VCS), Gold Standard (GS), Climate Action Reserve (CAR), and the American Carbon Registry (ACR). The data comes from the Berkeley Carbon Trading Project and contains proprietary data from Abatable.

The report aims to set out critical developer-level findings and better comprehend supply-side implications for the Voluntary Carbon Market (VCM), in contrast to other research publications which favour project or registry-specific profiling.

Remarks

This year’s report highlights how the developer ecosystem is going through a fundamental transformation.

Firstly, the ecosystem has exhibited the first signs of market consolidation, illustrated by the Top 15 developers (across all project types) representing a larger share of historical issuances in 2022.

Secondly, we believe 2022 was a record year for the number of financing rounds announced into carbon project developers. This result comes despite challenges facing the VCM due to the continued erosion of trust from corporate buyers around the question of quality and increased policy uncertainty.

Finally, although the developer ecosystem remains a highly fragmented market dominated by local players, the broader availability of financing options has allowed existing experienced developers to upsize their ambitions, execute expansion plans into new project types, and scale their blueprint projects into adjacent regions. As such, 2022 saw a large number of developers turn from country-specific into global operators.

In this Report

The 30-page report includes an analysis of:

• The State of the Carbon Developer Ecosystem
• 3 Key Observations in 2022
• 3 Key Themes to Watch in 2023
• 2022 League Tables:
  • Top 25 Developers | Global Nature-based Solutions
  • Top 25 Developers | Household Devices & Cookstoves
• Notable Landmark Deals in 2022
• Latest Policy Insights
• Latest Abatable Solutions

About Abatable

Abatable is a market intelligence and carbon procurement platform connecting corporate buyers, carbon project developers and intermediaries. Abatable helps corporates purchase high-quality credits to offset their hard-to-abate emissions. Get in touch if you are interested in learning more about our platform and how we can work together.