January 31, 2024: We coauthored a commentary, Instead of Carbon Offsets, We Need ‘Contributions’ to Forests, in Stanford Social Innovation Review in collaboration with the Wilkes Center for Climate Science & Policy at the University of Utah. New at the BCTPįebruary 16, 2024: We submitted public comments to the CFTC: Comment on Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Guidance Regarding the Listing of Voluntary Carbon Credit Derivative Contracts, RIN 3038–AF40 Our interdisciplinary research and outreach program is focused ensuring that carbon trading and offsetting programs support rather than undermine effective climate action. This failure squanders funds, good will, and precious time when real decarbonization could not be more urgent.

Carbon offsets allow businesses to claim a lower carbon footprint by paying someone else to reduce emissions. Research performed by us and others has found that most offset credits traded on the market today represent far less than their claimed benefits. In this brief moment when avoiding the worst impacts of climate change is still within reach, a surge of corporate climate commitments and quickly evolving state, national, and international climate policies is being undermined by the heavy use of carbon offsets. The Berkeley Carbon Trading Project at CEPP is a research and outreach program dedicated to studying the effectiveness of carbon trading and offset programs and ensuring that this understanding informs program design. Repository of Articles on Offset Quality.

California carbon credits