Carbonplace, the new carbon credit settlement platform, and Climate Impact X (CIX), the global carbon marketplace and exchange, have collaborated on a pilot to lower entry barriers for organizations seeking high-quality carbon credits on the voluntary carbon market while also providing a seamless experience for customers to discover, compare, purchase, and retire credits.
With worldwide demand for voluntary carbon credits predicted to double by 2030 and more than triple by 2050, carbon markets will play a critical role in accelerating the transition to a low-carbon economy. This project intends to transform the voluntary carbon market by incorporating the accessibility, trust, and transparency necessary for it to scale and have the most significant possible impact on climate change.
The pilot will establish the technological, legal, and operational foundation for conducting carbon credit transactions via CIX's platform, "Project Marketplace," which launched last week as a new digital platform for enterprises and carbon project suppliers, with Carbonplace handling all settlements. It will enable many new clients – including enterprises and financial institutions of all kinds – to advance their climate goals by purchasing and trading carbon credits to finance big-scale emissions removals or reductions that would not be achievable otherwise.
The alliance combines the strengths of the two newly established, high-profile participants in the carbon market. Carbonplace's extensive client base, proprietary settlement technology, wallet service for recording and storing voluntary carbon credits, and the stringent regulatory environment for banks will be combined with CIX's curated marketplace of quality-assured credits, enabling existing bank customers to scale their exposure to the carbon market. As a result, the final end-to-end solution will simplify access, trust, and transparency while increasing access, trust, and transparency.
CIX, a collaboration between DBS Bank, the Singapore Exchange, Standard Chartered, and Temasek, permits the direct purchase of high-quality carbon credits from specific projects. In addition, CIX safeguards the openness, integrity, and quality of carbon credits through satellite monitoring and machine learning, ensuring that projects are appraised for carbon sequestration capacity and benefits biodiversity and local communities.
Carbonplace is a settlement platform that will maintain a record of ownership and enable the exchange of verified carbon credits reliable, secure, and scalable. BNP Paribas, CIBC, Ita Unibanco, National Australia Bank, NatWest Group, Standard Chartered, and UBS are developing the fintech launched last year and is scheduled to be completely operational by the end of 2022. On its platform, only carbon credits that have been validated following internationally accepted criteria will be handled.
"Voluntary carbon credits provide a robust, market-based approach to financing solutions for climate mitigation. However, the rate of finance is still very low compared to what is needed to keep global warming under a 2 degrees Celsius pathway by 2030. The collaboration between Carbonplace and CIX, through Project Marketplace, brings together easy access to curated, quality credits and a settlement system underpinned by transparency and integrity. It is precisely the type of accelerator we need for scaling up the voluntary carbon market."
- Mikkel Larsen, CEO of CIX,
"Collaborating with CIX has the opportunity to transform the voluntary carbon credit market. Through Carbonplace, we can drive transparent and secure trading, provide access to global distribution channels, and, due to the highly regulated standards of the banking industry, remove the need for multiple intermediaries, simplifying the process for carbon credit sellers and helping buyers to trust the process more."
- Robert Begbie, CEO of NatWest Markets