When you think of Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, you probably aren't thinking about carbon removal. But should you be?
Today's guest is Victoria Harvey, CDR Strategy Lead at ClimeFi. ClimeFi just structured the world's first Article 6.2 international transfer of durable carbon removal credits between Norway and Switzerland, and there's a lot to discuss!
What is the relationship between corporate climate action and national obligations? Do NDCs (Nationally Determined Contributions) impact corporate net-zero targets? Can corporate action satisfy national goals? Does that somehow leave us double-counting carbon removal?
This and so many more questions about the mechanics of CDR and climate action get discussed! Tune in to learn more and hear about ClimeFi's important work.
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"CDR Market Review: trends and transactions that shaped Q2 2025" blogpost from ClimeFi
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
You have found yourself at the Reversing Climate Change
podcast. I'm Ross Kenyon, I'm the host.
Before we get started today, I want to tell you about the
sponsors of this episode. I'm so grateful we have a new
one, which is cool. Cdr Jobs, surely if you work in
carbon removal or aspire to, youhave been on the Cdr Jobs
website. They are the place to find all
of the Cdr jobs. No adulteration, no other
(00:24):
adjacency. It's carbon removal.
So that's the place to look. One of the things that is very
cool about being ACDR job posting site is that they get a
lot of data on employment in Cdrand they have not slept on their
data duties. In fact, last year they did ACDR
salary report, which details howmuch people make in the space,
(00:47):
if there's any discrepancies across gender or race, of which
countries, where are jobs being created in carbon removal.
They gathered over 800 data points, 400 individual
responses, and 400 salaries fromjob openings, which represents
only a partial sample size. But even still, that report was
generated A4 figure amount, which is a lot of times to
(01:08):
download a report. People want this information and
they're doing another survey this year.
They're doing another survey this year.
So recently I put out a small episode about why I think this
kind of work is important, aboutHR decisions, about pay
transparency. Why I think that's on net a good
strategy if you are an employer and also if you're an employee,
why you should talk to your colleagues about salary and
(01:31):
destigmatize conversations around that topic and why they
can be really useful. And I think the Cdr Jobs 2025
salary survey is a really powerful way to anchor that
conversation, to give you something to talk about because
it makes sure that employers arecreating a trustful environment.
And it's also making sure that employees are not being taken
(01:51):
advantage of in any way. I don't suspect that is
happening. Cdr is a small place that is
very mission driven, but it is beneficial for us to work
together to make sure that, you know, our peers are taken care
of or we ourselves are taken care of.
And if you are in a position of power, that you are creating a
kind of environment where peoplereally want to love the company
that they're at. And this is potentially one way
(02:12):
that you can do that. So I would say if you are
already working inside of carbonremoval, please go fill out the
2025 salary survey. The link is in the show notes.
And also if you're looking for ajob in carbon removal, Cdr jobs
dot Earth, that's where they are.
Go look through them, go apply for them.
If you're at a company and you want to sponsor their work,
that's also a possibility where you can get better visibility
(02:34):
for your jobs. So thank you.
New sponsor means a lot. Thank you, Cdr jobs team.
I appreciate your work and hope it continues for a long time.
We also have our beloved longtime sponsor, Arbonics is
back again. Arbonics is fascinating forestry
work in the EU, primarily in theBaltic States, and they just
released a new report on the state of European forest carbon
credits in 2025. It's a practical guide to how
(02:57):
forest credits are generated, verified, and how developers
handle permanence, leakage, and social integrity in a European
context. What's cool about it is that it
also breaks down how methodologies differ and how
pricing differs between these methodologies and why the timing
matters in a supply constrained market.
Unless you are a deep, very special type of nerd, this
content is hard to parse. But I think the work that our
(03:20):
bionics is doing to try to make this easily graspable by busy
people is really important. And you know, there's really
just not that many European horse carbon credits with demand
rising and a four station projects taking years to mature,
many high quality credits are sold out before issuance, which
I'm sure you've seen this or at least heard about it.
This report is a timely overviewof bottlenecks in the space and
(03:42):
the actors who are looking to solve it.
You can find this report in the show notes.
In any case, thank you CBR Jobs and our Bionics for your
sponsorship means so much to me.And now we will allow the show
to begin in earnest. Hey, thanks for listening to the
(04:04):
Reversing Climate Change podcast.
I'm the host Ross Kenyon. I sometimes describe myself as a
carbon removal obsessive, but I'm all over this place.
I just think climate is the mostinteresting place to spend ones
time. I'm going to switch the order of
this today. Before I get into the intro of
the show what we're talking about.
If you could please do me a favor and give the show a great
rating and review on Apple Podcasts and Spotify or wherever
(04:26):
you listen that has a rating or review function, please do so.
It is one of those high leveragethings you can do that takes you
only like 30 seconds but actually helps the show a lot.
Please do that if you at all can.
We also have paid subscriptions for $5 a month.
It gets rid of the ads that Spotify puts in at the beginning
of each show. There's bonus content.
(04:46):
There's a small like 2 minute question that I have from
today's episode that didn't really fit into the rest of the
flow, but I still want to preserve it.
So there's a bonus episode coming out later this week from
this episode. And you just get to be a super
fan who helps make this show go.Links to all those things for
how to support the show are in the show notes if you'd like to
do so. And now I'm going to tell you
about what we're talking about. So I don't know if he's caught
the news about this, but Climify, which refers to itself
(05:10):
as the leading portfolio managerfor durable carbon removals,
they put together some really fascinating deals and they
helped instrument the deal that just took place that was the
world's first Article 6.2 international transfer of
durable carbon removals. I spoke with.
Victoria Harvey, who is Climify Cdr strategy lead.
(05:32):
She's formerly at B0. Someone who's really close in to
engineered carbon removal and evaluating projects like that.
Normally carbon removal people. I'm making some assumptions
here, but most carbon removal people are not thinking purely
at the level of policy because not that much policy has
actually hit carbon removal in amarket shaping kind of way.
(05:55):
Most of the discussions in carbon removal tend to be about
receiving big off take agreements.
Who's getting them, who's not, which standards are going to
apply against which family methodologies does X off taker
accept biochar or not? Those are a lot of the the big
questions And most of the discussions about regulation
with the exceptions of things like 45 Q tend to be much more
(06:17):
future oriented like which carbon credits are going to fit
into which compliance market as it tends to be something that we
know will be epoch making when it happens.
But it's still a long way away. There's old jokes about this.
I've heard this attributed to Charles de Gaulle.
I don't know if it is, it's a little mean to Brazil, but you
(06:38):
could say it about basically anyplace.
The old joke is Brazil is the country of the future and always
will be. I've heard that same joke said
about fusion. Fusion is the technology of the
future and always will be. You know, conceivably that's
changing now. They got to change the joke.
Essentially, policy is the future of carbon removal and it
always will be. Hopefully not.
(06:59):
Hopefully at some point it will become present and more of it
will exist. The Paris Agreement is about the
obligations that countries have to meeting their climate goals,
and 6.2 is the part of the ParisAgreement that deals with the
transferability of carbon credits across country
boundaries so that countries that are net emitters can buy
(07:22):
credits from net negative countries.
Broadly speaking, I'm sure an expert in international climate
policy could duly school me on this, but we've not seen this
for carbon removal yet. And one of the most fascinating
parts of this show is Victoria and I talking about what does it
mean when countries are meeting their goals and they're meeting
(07:43):
their goals at least partially by corporate commitments like
this deal that Climify Structured has private companies
on the buying and selling side and yet countries are involved
in the negotiations too. We get into the trade-offs of
this way of structuring these deals.
I do not think it's going to be the final word on this.
There's still a lot more that I'd like to know and learn about
(08:05):
And I suspect this show serves as an excellent wedding of your
appetite. It's certainly wet mine to
investigate exactly how some of these mechanisms that haven't
much interacted with carbon removal or impacted the
marketplace may begin to play a bigger role as time goes on.
So good job Climify on on helping make this happen.
(08:27):
Climify's also just got great written content.
I've long admired their ability to produce thoughtful written
content about various facets of Cdr.
I'll put some links in the show notes.
Thanks for being on Victoria andhere is your show.
Thanks for being here, Victoria.Well.
(08:49):
Thank you for having me, sorry to be here.
I'm happy to have you. I saw the the news about Climify
like everyone else. I suspect for a number of people
in carbon removal, they maybe haven't paid the closest of
attention to what Article 6 has to do with carbon removal.
I think we feel kind of left outof it overall, to be honest.
(09:11):
Maybe we've slept on it longer than we need to, or maybe I'm
projecting out of my own psyche,or maybe both could be all of
those things at the same time. In any case, though, I wanted to
give people a nice freebie to revisit this topic, to
understand it as if from scratch.
And I'm thus tasking you to helpus understand what happened with
(09:32):
the Paris Agreement, what's its current status, and then we'll
go downstream from there. What this big deal is that
Climify helped orchestrate? You're laughing.
Sorry, I'm putting on you on thespot in some terrible way.
Well, then happy to go into this.
I think it was a pretty excitingannouncement on our side at
Climify. So definitely important to go
back to the beginning and and what this means and what it
(09:56):
means for Cdr. So I'm more than happy to do
that and hopefully get to a bit of the juicy bit about how more
people can get involved with it as well.
So at the end, so Article 6.2 ofthe Paris Agreement, and I'm
going to caveat this by saying I've been in the Cdr space for a
long time, that I am by no meansthe greatest policy expert in
(10:19):
the world, but I'm happy to write as as close to look into
it as possible. So Article 6 of the Paris
Agreement, so obviously the mechanism that allows for
international cooperation aroundeach country's nationally
determined contributions, so each country's targets to their
(10:41):
net zero of some kind. And within that there's lots of
different developing articles. Article 6.2 and 6.4 we certainly
hear about the most. I'm also secretly excited for
Article 6.8 in the future, but time will tell on that one.
But for now where we are is we have been able kind of fire was
(11:07):
involved in facilitating and structuring the first Article
6.2, a transaction of engineeredcarbon removal credits between
Norway and Switzerland. And what is that, you know,
that's, that's the announcement.So Article 6.2 was established
in 2021 at COP 21. And within Article 6.2, this is
(11:33):
the article that allows for bilateral or multilateral
agreements between countries forthe transfer of emissions
reductions or emissions removalsremovals credits.
And I think it's something that we have more commonly been
hearing about as exactly as you said at the top that we've been
hearing about more on the avoidance and reduction side of
(11:56):
things. I think, you know, my
perspective is because that's a market that we've seen, these
are technologies we've seen for a longer amount of time.
So we feel a little bit more confident in using those
technologies in this market. But what we've been able to do
is show that this is an opportunity for durable
innovative engineers, carbon removal technologies as well and
(12:19):
so to take it back. So within this transfer of
emissions reductions or removals, what it means is
essentially that there are two countries that are able to
transfer these credits, these removals between the countries
by essentially having an agreement between them that
(12:40):
allows a host country to give off a not sure the exactly
correct term here, their creditsto the buying company buying
country. And in doing so allows the CO2
removal that happened in that host country to then be
associated with the NDC's of thebuying country.
(13:05):
And there's a lot of things thatcome involved in the middle and,
and you know, a lot of steps to talk through which I, I think
today is a great time to do that.
But I, I think a key thing to establish at the very top is
that within this, within each transaction, both countries are
defining what is the corresponding adjustments.
(13:25):
So these are the key levers thatessentially prevent any double
counting of credit so that the host country and I country are
not both putting this on that national determined
constitutions. So that it's it's really clear
that where the CO2 arrival is actually being attributed to
which buyer it is being attributed to.
(13:45):
So yeah, that's kind of the veryhigh level intro to it.
Is it the case that Norway is a net removing country and they're
able to sell some of their net removals to Switzerland?
Is that a layperson's way of understanding it?
It's definitely one way that it could be put.
(14:07):
I think Norway is certainly we're moving more and there are
more, there are Cdr, large scaleCdr projects that are able to
scale up in Norway and quite an attractive way as well.
Just given the natural resourcesthat are there makes it very
appropriate for a lot of sequestration technologies, your
(14:29):
direct air capture with carbon storage, your bio CCS
technologies and, and those thathave injection, you know,
project that we looked at was injecting into Northern Lights,
one of the largest operational injection sites in, in Europe.
And those resources make it really easy to work with Norway
(14:50):
as that host country, if you will, and Switzerland on the
other side here, the buying country, it's a smaller country.
It's it doesn't have the same resources, but what it does have
is a lot of really motivated actors who want to be the buyers
and who want to be helping to build and motivate this market.
(15:11):
What's the relationship between Nationally Determined
contributions and what countrieshave to do?
And then what happens with all of these corporate deals that we
hear about? Do those corporate deals
interact at all with NDC's? Do 6.2 deals affect corporate
deals at all? Are they entirely different?
(15:32):
How should people understand those things?
Yeah. It's a, I think an important
thing to note here is that like there is a real opportunity
right now to help clarify this, some of this confusion with
these deals that are taking place.
And essentially these companies are working with government
(15:57):
organizations or developing, youknow, a clear understanding
between the government and thesecorporate actors.
So if we're taking the case of the deal that we just did with
the Swiss buyers in Switzerland and, and, and more than happy to
go into more more detail on the insurance and outs of that.
(16:17):
But we have this coalition of Swiss buyers who we've brought
together who want to help facilitate the first pilot
transaction of the Article 6.2 transfer between Switzerland and
Norway. In this case, you know, it was
an interesting use case. These two countries are fairly
advanced in the the Article 6.2 developments.
(16:42):
So we were able to bring this coalition of buyers together and
we're able to as well bring in the Swiss government to come on
and recognize this transaction as essentially A transaction
that can feed into the nationally determined
contribution. So what that means is that we
(17:05):
were able to bring together the corporate action and bring
together the government to say, yes, if this deal is moved
forward, it will feed into our nationally determined
contribution. And then it's just important to
get that into the contracting and get that into the terms of
the agreement. Holy crap that didn't help at
(17:26):
all. So we the companies are are
buying the carbon removal from aNorwegian company, but then also
Norway and Switzerland are each claiming accounting credits or
debits for their NDC's off of this deal.
Is that correct? Yes.
Huh. It sounds like corporate
(17:49):
purchases are going to be driving the NDC.
So it's like private action is determining the public outcomes.
Is that the kind of the model for how this works?
I, I think a great parallel to be made here is where are we
seeing all the action in engineered Cdr right now?
We're seeing it in the voluntarycarbon market.
(18:11):
We're seeing this is where the innovation is happening.
This is where the buys are happening.
This is where all the momentum is developing.
But ultimately we know that thisis going to transfer into, you
know, at the large scale into more compliance markets and this
will be something that is managed at the national scale,
the federal scale, depending on your country or jurisdiction.
(18:32):
So we have this ability to really help be innovative in the
technologies but also innovativein the transactions that take
place. And I am a firm believer that
the political environment is rightfully so slow moving,
building the standards, buildingthe frameworks, ensuring that
there's safeguards in place. But at the same time, they're
(18:54):
like picking up all the different innovations and, you
know, advancements that are taking place in in more this
private land. So in the same way for these
transactions, that is really theability to see a lot of the
innovation and Dr. come from thecorporate side.
And hopefully it is a way to really motivate or inform or
(19:15):
develop more of this understanding and scale of these
transactions in, in, in these more compliance and
international markets as well. And I think something to really
take back here is, you know, this is a pilot transaction.
And it's really something that has been learned by all parties,
by the corporate side, but also by the governments working in in
(19:38):
Switzerland, Norway, or is how this can develop in the future
and how this yeah be scaled up it to to support both countries.
Is the intention medium or long term for 6.2 to be country to
country deals or will 6.2 transfers essentially always
(19:59):
have corporate money where like corporate carbon accounting
books are being affected and country level NDC's are being
affected? Simultaneously, is there is
there an attempt in the future to untangle this?
Is this a pilot level thing or is this always the way it's
going to be? I'm gonna, I'm gonna, you know,
give my take and know that there's hundreds of others who
(20:22):
have a, a better understanding of this and.
This is a podcast you don't haveto be well informed to have an
opinion about. Anything.
No, but I like to come with. I'm I'm scientist and engineer
by training. I like to come with facts and
figures and be cognitive kind ofsuch.
I think that in the short term and honestly the medium term,
this is going to be really driven by corporate demanding
corporate action and there's a lot of lessons to be learned.
(20:45):
It's I, I think a lot on the contracting side that we were
able to do here. I think that we've learned a lot
ourselves on how to set these limitations, how to be agile,
how to set the terms, but also create the ability for some
flexibility if new specifications arise in for
(21:05):
example, the EU or in other areas that would inform the the
transaction at play. So that the agility is really
going to be something that is the short and medium term.
But in, in the long term, this is something that I, I do see
will be driven. Well, it just has to be.
Maybe this is my naivety coming through.
It's something that needs to be driven by the national level.
(21:26):
You know, we need, we're not going to get that alone through
corporate action. It's just not possible.
So we need this to motivate government officials, government
actors in this space on OK, thisis one way to do it.
Is this the right way to do it? How can we learn?
How can we scale, how can we implement so that we can get to
the sector we need? Yeah, it's an interesting design
(21:47):
decision because I've seen criticism of if you allow for
the carbon accounting books to count for both the corporate
layer and the NDC layer for countries, you you could end up
in some case where multiple people are claiming a negative
emission where only one existed.And so like the country of
Switzerland and companies withinSwitzerland who may also operate
(22:10):
in lots of other places should not all be claiming the same
negative emission on on their books.
But I can also see this as a very effective public private
partnership where if you just had a direct purchase from a
government to another government, that represents a
net outflow of taxpayer funds toforeign government for a mark on
(22:34):
a carbon accounting Ledger. Pretty bad value I would say
overall for the taxpayers. Be like, cool, that was a lot of
money. I went somewhere else and we
just have like we get to feel kind of good about it.
I could see that being politically very unpopular.
Having private subsidy into a public NDC like this might de
risk climate action, although itwill also cause its own
(22:56):
problems. Because how couldn't it?
Because that's just everything in the world.
It has a consequence to it. Feel free to tear me into
shreds. By the way, I don't know if to
what degree this is true or not.I think de risky now, I mean is
huge and it's, you know, extremely important.
I I think right now with removals as well, we're
predominantly, you know, the majority of the time dealing
(23:19):
with ex ante future projects. We're dealing with projects that
haven't been developed, We're dealing with projects where they
might not have the partners theyneed, they might not have the
logistics they need. This is a risky business and an
interesting thing that we found that clarifies of our portfolio,
over 40% of the projects we're currently transacting with are
delayed to some extent. So 40 percent, 40%.
(23:39):
Wow, interesting. And I think we have some buyers
who are comfortable with that and that's great.
And that's what it needs to be in the near time.
We need people who are engaging in this market to understand
that delays are inevitable because this is a sector that
has some risks. But the, the thing with risk is
that we can often identify them and we can identify where
(24:05):
safeguards have been implemented.
We can identify where there's clear plan and there's clear
targets that the project is aiming to meet.
And there's, there's really a lot of things that project
developers can do to mitigate risk.
So with all that, some form of due diligence on these projects,
some sort of unpacking, de risking of these projects is is,
(24:25):
is is going to be important for these projects being able to
really integrate into these Article 6 markets and and and
into these movements. These are future projects that
high risk unpacking the risk is important and there will be some
level of delay and some actors are going to be mad and some are
(24:46):
not going to understand why all this money is going somewhere
that and it's it's, it's, it's not seen an outcome straight
away. But given the gravity of really
what you and I get to work in every day in in the Cdr world,
it really feels like an important step in seeing things
work properly, learning from it,developing it, improving it, and
(25:08):
implementing it again. So I don't think you're wrong,
but I I don't see it as necessarily that concerning
right now when they're just a lot of things to learn and a lot
of things to improve. Yeah, that makes sense.
Although one counterpoint there,I did a show with Peter Miner
from Absolute Climate recently, and we were talking about how
(25:30):
essentially any sort of rule structure that is set up will
agglomerate vested interests around it because they built
businesses around the presumption that those stable
rules will persist. You know, they're bad rules.
They might just be there becausepeople do not want them to
change. So that puts the pressure on not
merely to be scrappy, move fast and break things, but actually
(25:53):
getting things really right really early might be important.
I have a follow up on that, but you're you probably the bait is
too good. Like you have to respond.
I mean, that's the world we livein.
Like, it would be great if we get it perfect at the beginning.
We should strive for that. But if we can get it as close to
possible as well and let the people who are running it
(26:15):
understand that there has to be some flexibility for changes.
Not drastic changes because we made huge mistakes, but changes
of, OK, this term was not the right one to use.
We need to reframe it to this. And I think with a lot of this
contracting stuff as well, there's the ability to define
that in the early stage of like this is something that we have
to monitor over time. In six months time, if it's not
(26:38):
at this stage or this hasn't been done, we have to better
define this term or something like that.
Like that is something that can be done if you're monitoring
these projects as they go forward.
So I think it's a trade off, butwe can't just say it's one and
done. We have to monitor it as it
develops and then that way it doesn't it doesn't explain to
ways that make us a bad story ofVCM.
(27:01):
You know, 1.22 point O whatever you want to call it.
Well, as someone who identifies as an engineer, is that
evolutionary, Incomplete by definition way of behaving,
difficult for your brain? No.
No, you like it that way. I like that way because as an
engineer you've got to build newthings and you've got to reverse
(27:22):
engineer things and you got to take them down to the beginning
and build them back up again andbuild them better.
So that's that's something that I feel like I can be
comfortable. With OK that's cool.
I feel like engineers are maybe attracted to fewer open system
problems, but maybe I'm working off of a stereotype.
Maybe I I'm I'm definitely not opposed to them.
(27:44):
I think maybe it was the dive into climate engineering at an
early stage and realizing it's crazy and exciting and a real
opportunity and there's no easy way forward.
OK, fair enough. Regarding 6.21 of the old fights
about it, I'm pretty sure they fixed it at this point.
But there was an accounting issue where countries like
(28:07):
Brazil that were net removing from forestry were wanting to
sell forestry credits but also not deduct the carbon off of the
carbon accounting balance sheet.So they would still remain a
carbon negative country even though they were selling real
interest in the carbon negativity.
Was that ever fixed, you know? Don't know, but that's very
(28:30):
clearly a problem. So I'm hoping so.
I mean, I feel like the corresponding adjustments came
in to mitigate that problem exactly.
Again, this is something that wesee in the voluntary market with
some people who sell products that then get to claim that
they're carbon neutral when they're not because they haven't
sold the credits into it. So it's a problem we've seen in
the BCM space and we're able to mitigate that with clear
(28:53):
reporting or registries and better, you know, tagging of, of
credits and, and, and where theygo on that side of things.
So in the same way with 6.2, thecorresponding adjustments have
come in as a mechanism that allows the host country, one
that is creating the carbon arrival to subtract the CO2 from
their national Ledger and then the buying company is able to
(29:18):
add it to their Ledger. So well, what this all comes
down to is just transparency of countries and them clearly
working with the supplier on, onthe host side to make it really
clear, working as well with the registry partner, whoever the
supplier is working with to be very transparent and really
clear about all of that. So I'm hoping that problems been
fixed and you know that that otherwise we got some problems
(29:41):
ahead. Why now?
Is there some sort of deadline coming up for getting these
deals done? Is it just it finally
materialized? Why is this happening right now?
Yeah. I mean for us, we are a European
company and we've got a big basein Zurich and in Paris as well.
(30:02):
But with that being in Zurich and and being in Switzerland, we
are able to work with a lot of iron actors who have been
interested in this for a while and have been really been been
having all the kernels, you know, of.
This is something that we want to do makes sense for us as
Switzerland. We need to work with a country
where we already have bilateral agreements in place.
(30:23):
Norway is a clear, a clear option for that with with what's
already been laid down. So the kernels have all been
been, you know, pre popping in in different places.
And I think it made a lot of sense to bring these different
actors who have interests but aren't able to go the whole way
alone or, you know, have some hesitancy to engage in the first
(30:46):
mission alone to bring them together in this evolution of
buyers, which we did. So by bringing all these these
actors together, there's almost it's another way to de risk.
No, it's, it's more support coming together for this
transaction and it's, it's something then that is, is
allows the host country, I'm sorry, the buying country,
Switzerland in this case, who really approve it is like these
(31:08):
are Swiss buyers where's we're the Swiss company, this Swiss
government even we this is something we really want to
recognize as a real opportunity for us as a country.
So that was all happening with the buyers and, and the
government, anything for us justbeing that facilitator and being
someone that can provide the duediligence against, you know, a
(31:32):
framework that we feel really strongly about and unpacking
these risks from carbon to delivery to beyond carbon.
And then as well-being someone who has done a lot of
contracting for Cdr, Cdr purchases.
It really felt like this was an innovative opportunity for us to
be able to get more informed by what was happening at this, this
(31:53):
this list school lands working with these actors.
But I think it's it's less about, hi, I'm going to say
something that I feel like everyone always says.
So I apologize, but it's why now?
But why not now? We have the buyers, we have the
suppliers, we have credits, you know, that can be available in
(32:13):
the next few years. It made a lot of sense.
And yeah, I think for us, we felt like we were the right
people to get involved, to help facilitate involved.
I would have been quicker with awitty remark, but it broke my
brain a little bit. I think it's several reasons why
not now, but whatever, I don't know.
(32:33):
Well, maybe just the European context.
There's so much policy activity happening in Europe right now.
And I was also just reflecting alittle bit on how direct
procurement may affect the marketplace over there too, and
how that interacts with NBCS too.
So direct procurement happening in Germany, that's an
interesting case where German taxpayers pay directly for NDC's
(32:54):
for something that and Switzerland they had corporate
subsidy for. But maybe in Germany that's seen
in just as a internal subsidy for their carbon removal
industry. And maybe it's worth it for
economic development reasons more so than just meeting their
Article 6 obligations. I'm also just thinking about all
of the cap and trade markets that are getting set up right
now in places like Vietnam and China and of course Japan's GX
(33:18):
Lee coming online. I'm wondering if that's going to
see more of these types of country level deals taking
place. It's not just going to be
everyone in carbon removal thinks of Frontier in Microsoft
and Google and things like that.Five years from now, are we
going to be saying that countries are tending to be
involved in these deals? I mean, alternatively, we're
(33:38):
heading into a trade war environment where maybe there's
less international trade and people are like much more
protective of exporting their carbon removals.
I could see that happening as well.
What's your sense on on momentumin geopolitics?
No small questions here. Sorry, Victoria, good luck.
No, I mean my perspective on it is that there is going to be
(34:00):
motivation, interest at the bareminimum from many different
countries. I think Japan, as you said is a
great one that that that can getinvolved in this.
I think there are a few others such as Canada and you know even
Kenya who can like who want to be involved in this and who have
great resources and great projects to contribute.
So I think there are a lot of exciting opportunities and I
(34:22):
think ultimately, you know, there is a lot, you know, of
complexities around this discussion as can be seen in
this very confusing conversationthat we're having.
But now that we've done it, I think that it actually makes it
a lot easier. I think like we now have a
framework for how we can do this.
And we now have learnings from the first time.
(34:44):
And I think with each, as I've already said this, but with each
time it gets easier. And I think that the hurdle is
getting actors interested. And Microsoft and Frontier won't
be there forever, forever. But we're increasingly
understanding that this is goingto be a necessary part of our
future to some degree. And, and the motivation will not
(35:04):
always be there from governments, you know,
administrations and, and politics aren't there for
forever, but some of the risks that we're seeing are.
So I think that if we're able towithstand elections and we're
able to get past all that, I do think this motivation is going
to be there. And I, I think it's important
just to reflect and say like, it's, it's might seem more scary
(35:27):
than it is, but this is very similar to a lot of what we've
seen in the VCM around CDRS for recent years.
And it's, it's just a bit further, a bit more that needs
to be recognized at the nationallevel.
And if you're working with the right actors and you have the
right connections to these government officials, there's,
there's really a path to be trodden.
(35:47):
And it can be implemented relatively quickly and carefully
at the same time. What are you seeing from where
you said that someone working inCdr might not know about?
Interesting. Question Well, I think something
you know, I don't clarify in October and I've been in the
space for a long time as a researcher and risk.
(36:08):
So been a lot of looking at further documents and unpacking
the rest at the, the, the on thegrounds coming here.
The most interesting thing to meis understanding really a lot of
the commercial opportunities I'mgoing to call them the
contractual opportunities for buyers with yours buyers
(36:31):
engaging say can still really besmoothers can be, you know,
there's a lot to be built, there's a lot of opportunity
ahead and there's a lot of things around options.
And you know that meaning that you can buy CDRS today and you
can reserve options for future ventures of CDRS from the the
(36:53):
same developer and putting thoseterms into contracts and
understanding how to really scale up commitment with one
company, with a portfolio of companies with whatever it may
be. I think that that's so exciting
and it really paves the way for a lot of different, yeah, a lot
of it different opportunities for new actors, maybe smaller
(37:14):
actors to get involved if they can be an option for land and if
there is really a lot of innovation around that.
So options is really exciting. But beyond that there's right.
So first for few years, all these contractual things that
you can really like you can you can really step into the space
now, learn a lot. Do you risk these projects and
(37:35):
through these contractual mechanisms and do the due
diligence on the project seems fine, Joe Joe would skip what
step that and hopefully you know, that really supports the
scaring and in this early stage.So that's what's exciting me
right now. That's so funny that you went in
a direction of financial engineering and contracting and
(37:56):
legal as a realm for innovation.I I might have expected you to
to look elsewhere. Why that they're not?
But you're not a you're not a lawyer like business law person
by by trade. I think there's a lot of
exciting things around these technologies.
You know, there's a lot of innovations and cost
optimizations. We're seeing really innovative
(38:20):
methods of DAC or or of biochar,new methodologies on different
standards bodies that are reallyhelping, you know, mitigate some
of the risks, not all the risks,but some of the risks.
So we're seeing a lot of innovation on the technology
side. We've been seeing that for
years. So if we're going to want to
scale the market, I think, you know, this the whole chicken leg
thing that we always talk about,I think making it easier for
(38:42):
buyers to get in and making it exciting for them to get in is,
is, really is, is interesting. And that's, that's definitely
something that we, we really aimto provide by, you know, working
with them throughout all this and being that partner that can
do the end to end services so that they can benefit from the
opportunities of engaging in this new sector and can do it in
(39:05):
a way that, you know, hopefully is sustainable and, and at the
large scale, very equitable as well for every active involved.
What's next for Climify? Are you able to say much about
the deals you got in the pipeline or or something else?
Throw me a little tidbit here. Yeah.
So we are currently running or in the in the later stages of
(39:27):
running an RFP request for proposal for two Cdr buyers.
So these are large scale off takes for portfolios of projects
across durable Cdr pathways. So that will be an exciting
announcement later this year once it's all announced and you
(39:47):
know, gone through the due diligence and the contracting
and and all that fun stuff. And so that's something to look
out for. But on a more near term note, we
have AQ 2 market report coming out this week so that we'll have
all the all the insights on all the big buys of the last year,
all the big policy movements. But this year as well, what
(40:10):
we've done is. A a bit on what does it look
like if we take Microsoft out ofthe equation as well.
So I think that that's a an interesting one to look at.
So what? Does it look like, I mean
there's increasingly dominant atthis point, but can you say
anything about the trends that happen if you remove Microsoft
from the equations? Yeah.
I mean the it's, it's still a positive sign in terms of what
(40:32):
engagements look like for the quarter.
So I think that that's that's the the key take away.
I think it's, it's not just one actor that are other actors and
it's across pathways as well. It's it's not just in one area.
So we're still seeing the portfolio develop, which is all
good science. My default lately has been much
(40:53):
more pessimistic than I used to be.
Am I wrong? Can you can you talk me into
optimism? OK, yes, I'm way too optimistic
sometimes to a default. I'll meet you in the middle,
like trying like a little bit closer.
OK. What should be optimistic about
(41:14):
not only do we have Article 6.2 deals now happening and really
this motivation on the international market, we have
new buyers enter entering the space.
I think a number of new large scale deals that happened in the
last quarter, you know, new companies coming through, wild
assets being won and more, more developments happening with
projects, you know, big innovative projects such as Deep
(41:39):
Sky in Canada moving forward andgetting sat instead of
construction registries having first of a kind issuance under
new methodologies. I mean that to me keeps me
going. It's exciting to see it's it's
AI think more people trying these methodologies and seeing
where to learn. I think that that's really
exciting. So ways to be optimistic is that
(42:01):
the policy is moving forward, the targets are scaling,
issuance and retirement is happening, new buyers are coming
in. I think we're building a market
and we're building the foundations right now.
And I think that that's really exciting.
But again, that's overly optimistic on my side
potentially. Is solar radiation management
(42:22):
coming? Well, I think it's going to, I
think it's going to have to, at this stage, you know, we can't,
we can't ignore it. I think, you know, we just, I'm
sitting in the UK, my colleaguesare in Europe.
We just had an intense heat wave.
We've got another 1 coming this week.
(42:44):
That is not something to be optimistic about.
But I, I think that let's see what happens.
I don't think it's happening this decade, but we, we know
that there's some great people working on it and doing some
exciting research. So again, these guards are in
place, they're doing it in the right way.
They're having community engagement.
They're having that sort of development.
I think I'm right. Why not?
(43:05):
I'm seeing more people talk about that openly.
For a while it was much more theoretical, and now it's doing
much more. Like we're so deep in the
overshoot that it's almost an issue of when, not if.
Yeah, To me, I find it so crazy that when I first joined the Cdr
space and was talking about it in a research lens, like you
couldn't mention Geo engineering.
(43:25):
You had to organize arenas wherepeople had to like have
personas, they couldn't say they're a part of specific
company. Like the we, we really just
couldn't say things. And now we're at a stage where
we're like or not, you want to be a buyer, you want to be a
supplier, like let's go. So yeah, I think it's, I think
it's probably easier to talk about.
And that should, yeah, idea. Yeah, I I told this on a show
(43:48):
that hasn't been released yet, but has already been recorded.
So it's not like it's weird timeloop problem, but we were
talking about this where when I started in fiber removal was
about 8 years ago. You said your, your 5, five
years. OK, So eight years ago was still
like Cdr was still like, I see David Keith as being that for
(44:09):
intellectual godfather who's, who's like the main person in
both of those fields and major capacities.
Like, and now it's funny to see,it's kind of like creeping back
and we're, we're now we're like,OK, we're now a part of the
climate intervention crew. I mean, there definitely is no
denying it. We're all a little bit crazy and
that's OK. But I think it's nice that
carbon removal is kind of like this bucket of exciting
(44:31):
opportunities, as I said, and anengineer, I think that bringing
nature and type together is awesome if we do it in the right
way. So a bit of craziness managed is
not too bad. Oh man, I don't even know what
to say about it. It's it's intellectually
stimulating, emotionally, spiritually, I don't know, look
like I messed up my hair saying it.
(44:52):
That's how strongly I feel aboutit.
Victoria, thank you Bert for sharing.
I appreciate your thoughts on all of what's happening with 6.2
Article 6 in the Paris Agreement.
Just generally, thanks for helping explain that to people.
I'm a big fan of Climathi think you guys put out amazing written
content. I always make sure to read those
when they come out, so thanks for working on that.
(45:12):
Thanks for the thought leadership and thanks for doing
such amazing deals.
You have found yourself at the Reversing Climate Change
podcast. I'm Ross Kenyon, I'm the host.
Before we get started today, I want to tell you about the
sponsors of this episode. I'm so grateful we have a new
one, which is cool. Cdr Jobs, surely if you work in
carbon removal or aspire to, youhave been on the Cdr Jobs
website. They are the place to find all
of the Cdr jobs. No adulteration, no other
(00:24):
adjacency. It's carbon removal.
So that's the place to look. One of the things that is very
cool about being ACDR job posting site is that they get a
lot of data on employment in Cdrand they have not slept on their
data duties. In fact, last year they did ACDR
salary report, which details howmuch people make in the space,
(00:47):
if there's any discrepancies across gender or race, of which
countries, where are jobs being created in carbon removal.
They gathered over 800 data points, 400 individual
responses, and 400 salaries fromjob openings, which represents
only a partial sample size. But even still, that report was
generated A4 figure amount, which is a lot of times to
(01:08):
download a report. People want this information and
they're doing another survey this year.
They're doing another survey this year.
So recently I put out a small episode about why I think this
kind of work is important, aboutHR decisions, about pay
transparency. Why I think that's on net a good
strategy if you are an employer and also if you're an employee,
why you should talk to your colleagues about salary and
(01:31):
destigmatize conversations around that topic and why they
can be really useful. And I think the Cdr Jobs 2025
salary survey is a really powerful way to anchor that
conversation, to give you something to talk about because
it makes sure that employers arecreating a trustful environment.
And it's also making sure that employees are not being taken
(01:51):
advantage of in any way. I don't suspect that is
happening. Cdr is a small place that is
very mission driven, but it is beneficial for us to work
together to make sure that, you know, our peers are taken care
of or we ourselves are taken care of.
And if you are in a position of power, that you are creating a
kind of environment where peoplereally want to love the company
that they're at. And this is potentially one way
(02:12):
that you can do that. So I would say if you are
already working inside of carbonremoval, please go fill out the
2025 salary survey. The link is in the show notes.
And also if you're looking for ajob in carbon removal, Cdr jobs
dot Earth, that's where they are.
Go look through them, go apply for them.
If you're at a company and you want to sponsor their work,
that's also a possibility where you can get better visibility
(02:34):
for your jobs. So thank you.
New sponsor means a lot. Thank you, Cdr jobs team.
I appreciate your work and hope it continues for a long time.
We also have our beloved longtime sponsor, Arbonics is
back again. Arbonics is fascinating forestry
work in the EU, primarily in theBaltic States, and they just
released a new report on the state of European forest carbon
credits in 2025. It's a practical guide to how
(02:57):
forest credits are generated, verified, and how developers
handle permanence, leakage, and social integrity in a European
context. What's cool about it is that it
also breaks down how methodologies differ and how
pricing differs between these methodologies and why the timing
matters in a supply constrained market.
Unless you are a deep, very special type of nerd, this
content is hard to parse. But I think the work that our
(03:20):
bionics is doing to try to make this easily graspable by busy
people is really important. And you know, there's really
just not that many European horse carbon credits with demand
rising and a four station projects taking years to mature,
many high quality credits are sold out before issuance, which
I'm sure you've seen this or at least heard about it.
This report is a timely overviewof bottlenecks in the space and
(03:42):
the actors who are looking to solve it.
You can find this report in the show notes.
In any case, thank you CBR Jobs and our Bionics for your
sponsorship means so much to me.And now we will allow the show
to begin in earnest. Hey, thanks for listening to the
(04:04):
Reversing Climate Change podcast.
I'm the host Ross Kenyon. I sometimes describe myself as a
carbon removal obsessive, but I'm all over this place.
I just think climate is the mostinteresting place to spend ones
time. I'm going to switch the order of
this today. Before I get into the intro of
the show what we're talking about.
If you could please do me a favor and give the show a great
rating and review on Apple Podcasts and Spotify or wherever
(04:26):
you listen that has a rating or review function, please do so.
It is one of those high leveragethings you can do that takes you
only like 30 seconds but actually helps the show a lot.
Please do that if you at all can.
We also have paid subscriptions for $5 a month.
It gets rid of the ads that Spotify puts in at the beginning
of each show. There's bonus content.
(04:46):
There's a small like 2 minute question that I have from
today's episode that didn't really fit into the rest of the
flow, but I still want to preserve it.
So there's a bonus episode coming out later this week from
this episode. And you just get to be a super
fan who helps make this show go.Links to all those things for
how to support the show are in the show notes if you'd like to
do so. And now I'm going to tell you
about what we're talking about. So I don't know if he's caught
the news about this, but Climify, which refers to itself
(05:10):
as the leading portfolio managerfor durable carbon removals,
they put together some really fascinating deals and they
helped instrument the deal that just took place that was the
world's first Article 6.2 international transfer of
durable carbon removals. I spoke with.
Victoria Harvey, who is Climify Cdr strategy lead.
(05:32):
She's formerly at B0. Someone who's really close in to
engineered carbon removal and evaluating projects like that.
Normally carbon removal people. I'm making some assumptions
here, but most carbon removal people are not thinking purely
at the level of policy because not that much policy has
actually hit carbon removal in amarket shaping kind of way.
(05:55):
Most of the discussions in carbon removal tend to be about
receiving big off take agreements.
Who's getting them, who's not, which standards are going to
apply against which family methodologies does X off taker
accept biochar or not? Those are a lot of the the big
questions And most of the discussions about regulation
with the exceptions of things like 45 Q tend to be much more
(06:17):
future oriented like which carbon credits are going to fit
into which compliance market as it tends to be something that we
know will be epoch making when it happens.
But it's still a long way away. There's old jokes about this.
I've heard this attributed to Charles de Gaulle.
I don't know if it is, it's a little mean to Brazil, but you
(06:38):
could say it about basically anyplace.
The old joke is Brazil is the country of the future and always
will be. I've heard that same joke said
about fusion. Fusion is the technology of the
future and always will be. You know, conceivably that's
changing now. They got to change the joke.
Essentially, policy is the future of carbon removal and it
always will be. Hopefully not.
(06:59):
Hopefully at some point it will become present and more of it
will exist. The Paris Agreement is about the
obligations that countries have to meeting their climate goals,
and 6.2 is the part of the ParisAgreement that deals with the
transferability of carbon credits across country
boundaries so that countries that are net emitters can buy
(07:22):
credits from net negative countries.
Broadly speaking, I'm sure an expert in international climate
policy could duly school me on this, but we've not seen this
for carbon removal yet. And one of the most fascinating
parts of this show is Victoria and I talking about what does it
mean when countries are meeting their goals and they're meeting
(07:43):
their goals at least partially by corporate commitments like
this deal that Climify Structured has private companies
on the buying and selling side and yet countries are involved
in the negotiations too. We get into the trade-offs of
this way of structuring these deals.
I do not think it's going to be the final word on this.
There's still a lot more that I'd like to know and learn about
(08:05):
And I suspect this show serves as an excellent wedding of your
appetite. It's certainly wet mine to
investigate exactly how some of these mechanisms that haven't
much interacted with carbon removal or impacted the
marketplace may begin to play a bigger role as time goes on.
So good job Climify on on helping make this happen.
(08:27):
Climify's also just got great written content.
I've long admired their ability to produce thoughtful written
content about various facets of Cdr.
I'll put some links in the show notes.
Thanks for being on Victoria andhere is your show.
Thanks for being here, Victoria.Well.
(08:49):
Thank you for having me, sorry to be here.
I'm happy to have you. I saw the the news about Climify
like everyone else. I suspect for a number of people
in carbon removal, they maybe haven't paid the closest of
attention to what Article 6 has to do with carbon removal.
I think we feel kind of left outof it overall, to be honest.
(09:11):
Maybe we've slept on it longer than we need to, or maybe I'm
projecting out of my own psyche,or maybe both could be all of
those things at the same time. In any case, though, I wanted to
give people a nice freebie to revisit this topic, to
understand it as if from scratch.
And I'm thus tasking you to helpus understand what happened with
(09:32):
the Paris Agreement, what's its current status, and then we'll
go downstream from there. What this big deal is that
Climify helped orchestrate? You're laughing.
Sorry, I'm putting on you on thespot in some terrible way.
Well, then happy to go into this.
I think it was a pretty excitingannouncement on our side at
Climify. So definitely important to go
back to the beginning and and what this means and what it
(09:56):
means for Cdr. So I'm more than happy to do
that and hopefully get to a bit of the juicy bit about how more
people can get involved with it as well.
So at the end, so Article 6.2 ofthe Paris Agreement, and I'm
going to caveat this by saying I've been in the Cdr space for a
long time, that I am by no meansthe greatest policy expert in
(10:19):
the world, but I'm happy to write as as close to look into
it as possible. So Article 6 of the Paris
Agreement, so obviously the mechanism that allows for
international cooperation aroundeach country's nationally
determined contributions, so each country's targets to their
(10:41):
net zero of some kind. And within that there's lots of
different developing articles. Article 6.2 and 6.4 we certainly
hear about the most. I'm also secretly excited for
Article 6.8 in the future, but time will tell on that one.
But for now where we are is we have been able kind of fire was
(11:07):
involved in facilitating and structuring the first Article
6.2, a transaction of engineeredcarbon removal credits between
Norway and Switzerland. And what is that, you know,
that's, that's the announcement.So Article 6.2 was established
in 2021 at COP 21. And within Article 6.2, this is
(11:33):
the article that allows for bilateral or multilateral
agreements between countries forthe transfer of emissions
reductions or emissions removalsremovals credits.
And I think it's something that we have more commonly been
hearing about as exactly as you said at the top that we've been
hearing about more on the avoidance and reduction side of
(11:56):
things. I think, you know, my
perspective is because that's a market that we've seen, these
are technologies we've seen for a longer amount of time.
So we feel a little bit more confident in using those
technologies in this market. But what we've been able to do
is show that this is an opportunity for durable
innovative engineers, carbon removal technologies as well and
(12:19):
so to take it back. So within this transfer of
emissions reductions or removals, what it means is
essentially that there are two countries that are able to
transfer these credits, these removals between the countries
by essentially having an agreement between them that
(12:40):
allows a host country to give off a not sure the exactly
correct term here, their creditsto the buying company buying
country. And in doing so allows the CO2
removal that happened in that host country to then be
associated with the NDC's of thebuying country.
(13:05):
And there's a lot of things thatcome involved in the middle and,
and you know, a lot of steps to talk through which I, I think
today is a great time to do that.
But I, I think a key thing to establish at the very top is
that within this, within each transaction, both countries are
defining what is the corresponding adjustments.
(13:25):
So these are the key levers thatessentially prevent any double
counting of credit so that the host country and I country are
not both putting this on that national determined
constitutions. So that it's it's really clear
that where the CO2 arrival is actually being attributed to
which buyer it is being attributed to.
(13:45):
So yeah, that's kind of the veryhigh level intro to it.
Is it the case that Norway is a net removing country and they're
able to sell some of their net removals to Switzerland?
Is that a layperson's way of understanding it?
It's definitely one way that it could be put.
(14:07):
I think Norway is certainly we're moving more and there are
more, there are Cdr, large scaleCdr projects that are able to
scale up in Norway and quite an attractive way as well.
Just given the natural resourcesthat are there makes it very
appropriate for a lot of sequestration technologies, your
(14:29):
direct air capture with carbon storage, your bio CCS
technologies and, and those thathave injection, you know,
project that we looked at was injecting into Northern Lights,
one of the largest operational injection sites in, in Europe.
And those resources make it really easy to work with Norway
(14:50):
as that host country, if you will, and Switzerland on the
other side here, the buying country, it's a smaller country.
It's it doesn't have the same resources, but what it does have
is a lot of really motivated actors who want to be the buyers
and who want to be helping to build and motivate this market.
(15:11):
What's the relationship between Nationally Determined
contributions and what countrieshave to do?
And then what happens with all of these corporate deals that we
hear about? Do those corporate deals
interact at all with NDC's? Do 6.2 deals affect corporate
deals at all? Are they entirely different?
(15:32):
How should people understand those things?
Yeah. It's a, I think an important
thing to note here is that like there is a real opportunity
right now to help clarify this, some of this confusion with
these deals that are taking place.
And essentially these companies are working with government
(15:57):
organizations or developing, youknow, a clear understanding
between the government and thesecorporate actors.
So if we're taking the case of the deal that we just did with
the Swiss buyers in Switzerland and, and, and more than happy to
go into more more detail on the insurance and outs of that.
(16:17):
But we have this coalition of Swiss buyers who we've brought
together who want to help facilitate the first pilot
transaction of the Article 6.2 transfer between Switzerland and
Norway. In this case, you know, it was
an interesting use case. These two countries are fairly
advanced in the the Article 6.2 developments.
(16:42):
So we were able to bring this coalition of buyers together and
we're able to as well bring in the Swiss government to come on
and recognize this transaction as essentially A transaction
that can feed into the nationally determined
contribution. So what that means is that we
(17:05):
were able to bring together the corporate action and bring
together the government to say, yes, if this deal is moved
forward, it will feed into our nationally determined
contribution. And then it's just important to
get that into the contracting and get that into the terms of
the agreement. Holy crap that didn't help at
(17:26):
all. So we the companies are are
buying the carbon removal from aNorwegian company, but then also
Norway and Switzerland are each claiming accounting credits or
debits for their NDC's off of this deal.
Is that correct? Yes.
Huh. It sounds like corporate
(17:49):
purchases are going to be driving the NDC.
So it's like private action is determining the public outcomes.
Is that the kind of the model for how this works?
I, I think a great parallel to be made here is where are we
seeing all the action in engineered Cdr right now?
We're seeing it in the voluntarycarbon market.
(18:11):
We're seeing this is where the innovation is happening.
This is where the buys are happening.
This is where all the momentum is developing.
But ultimately we know that thisis going to transfer into, you
know, at the large scale into more compliance markets and this
will be something that is managed at the national scale,
the federal scale, depending on your country or jurisdiction.
(18:32):
So we have this ability to really help be innovative in the
technologies but also innovativein the transactions that take
place. And I am a firm believer that
the political environment is rightfully so slow moving,
building the standards, buildingthe frameworks, ensuring that
there's safeguards in place. But at the same time, they're
(18:54):
like picking up all the different innovations and, you
know, advancements that are taking place in in more this
private land. So in the same way for these
transactions, that is really theability to see a lot of the
innovation and Dr. come from thecorporate side.
And hopefully it is a way to really motivate or inform or
(19:15):
develop more of this understanding and scale of these
transactions in, in, in these more compliance and
international markets as well. And I think something to really
take back here is, you know, this is a pilot transaction.
And it's really something that has been learned by all parties,
by the corporate side, but also by the governments working in in
(19:38):
Switzerland, Norway, or is how this can develop in the future
and how this yeah be scaled up it to to support both countries.
Is the intention medium or long term for 6.2 to be country to
country deals or will 6.2 transfers essentially always
(19:59):
have corporate money where like corporate carbon accounting
books are being affected and country level NDC's are being
affected? Simultaneously, is there is
there an attempt in the future to untangle this?
Is this a pilot level thing or is this always the way it's
going to be? I'm gonna, I'm gonna, you know,
give my take and know that there's hundreds of others who
(20:22):
have a, a better understanding of this and.
This is a podcast you don't haveto be well informed to have an
opinion about. Anything.
No, but I like to come with. I'm I'm scientist and engineer
by training. I like to come with facts and
figures and be cognitive kind ofsuch.
I think that in the short term and honestly the medium term,
this is going to be really driven by corporate demanding
corporate action and there's a lot of lessons to be learned.
(20:45):
It's I, I think a lot on the contracting side that we were
able to do here. I think that we've learned a lot
ourselves on how to set these limitations, how to be agile,
how to set the terms, but also create the ability for some
flexibility if new specifications arise in for
(21:05):
example, the EU or in other areas that would inform the the
transaction at play. So that the agility is really
going to be something that is the short and medium term.
But in, in the long term, this is something that I, I do see
will be driven. Well, it just has to be.
Maybe this is my naivety coming through.
It's something that needs to be driven by the national level.
(21:26):
You know, we need, we're not going to get that alone through
corporate action. It's just not possible.
So we need this to motivate government officials, government
actors in this space on OK, thisis one way to do it.
Is this the right way to do it? How can we learn?
How can we scale, how can we implement so that we can get to
the sector we need? Yeah, it's an interesting design
(21:47):
decision because I've seen criticism of if you allow for
the carbon accounting books to count for both the corporate
layer and the NDC layer for countries, you you could end up
in some case where multiple people are claiming a negative
emission where only one existed.And so like the country of
Switzerland and companies withinSwitzerland who may also operate
(22:10):
in lots of other places should not all be claiming the same
negative emission on on their books.
But I can also see this as a very effective public private
partnership where if you just had a direct purchase from a
government to another government, that represents a
net outflow of taxpayer funds toforeign government for a mark on
(22:34):
a carbon accounting Ledger. Pretty bad value I would say
overall for the taxpayers. Be like, cool, that was a lot of
money. I went somewhere else and we
just have like we get to feel kind of good about it.
I could see that being politically very unpopular.
Having private subsidy into a public NDC like this might de
risk climate action, although itwill also cause its own
(22:56):
problems. Because how couldn't it?
Because that's just everything in the world.
It has a consequence to it. Feel free to tear me into
shreds. By the way, I don't know if to
what degree this is true or not.I think de risky now, I mean is
huge and it's, you know, extremely important.
I I think right now with removals as well, we're
predominantly, you know, the majority of the time dealing
(23:19):
with ex ante future projects. We're dealing with projects that
haven't been developed, We're dealing with projects where they
might not have the partners theyneed, they might not have the
logistics they need. This is a risky business and an
interesting thing that we found that clarifies of our portfolio,
over 40% of the projects we're currently transacting with are
delayed to some extent. So 40 percent, 40%.
(23:39):
Wow, interesting. And I think we have some buyers
who are comfortable with that and that's great.
And that's what it needs to be in the near time.
We need people who are engaging in this market to understand
that delays are inevitable because this is a sector that
has some risks. But the, the thing with risk is
that we can often identify them and we can identify where
(24:05):
safeguards have been implemented.
We can identify where there's clear plan and there's clear
targets that the project is aiming to meet.
And there's, there's really a lot of things that project
developers can do to mitigate risk.
So with all that, some form of due diligence on these projects,
some sort of unpacking, de risking of these projects is is,
(24:25):
is is going to be important for these projects being able to
really integrate into these Article 6 markets and and and
into these movements. These are future projects that
high risk unpacking the risk is important and there will be some
level of delay and some actors are going to be mad and some are
(24:46):
not going to understand why all this money is going somewhere
that and it's it's, it's, it's not seen an outcome straight
away. But given the gravity of really
what you and I get to work in every day in in the Cdr world,
it really feels like an important step in seeing things
work properly, learning from it,developing it, improving it, and
(25:08):
implementing it again. So I don't think you're wrong,
but I I don't see it as necessarily that concerning
right now when they're just a lot of things to learn and a lot
of things to improve. Yeah, that makes sense.
Although one counterpoint there,I did a show with Peter Miner
from Absolute Climate recently, and we were talking about how
(25:30):
essentially any sort of rule structure that is set up will
agglomerate vested interests around it because they built
businesses around the presumption that those stable
rules will persist. You know, they're bad rules.
They might just be there becausepeople do not want them to
change. So that puts the pressure on not
merely to be scrappy, move fast and break things, but actually
(25:53):
getting things really right really early might be important.
I have a follow up on that, but you're you probably the bait is
too good. Like you have to respond.
I mean, that's the world we livein.
Like, it would be great if we get it perfect at the beginning.
We should strive for that. But if we can get it as close to
possible as well and let the people who are running it
(26:15):
understand that there has to be some flexibility for changes.
Not drastic changes because we made huge mistakes, but changes
of, OK, this term was not the right one to use.
We need to reframe it to this. And I think with a lot of this
contracting stuff as well, there's the ability to define
that in the early stage of like this is something that we have
to monitor over time. In six months time, if it's not
(26:38):
at this stage or this hasn't been done, we have to better
define this term or something like that.
Like that is something that can be done if you're monitoring
these projects as they go forward.
So I think it's a trade off, butwe can't just say it's one and
done. We have to monitor it as it
develops and then that way it doesn't it doesn't explain to
ways that make us a bad story ofVCM.
(27:01):
You know, 1.22 point O whatever you want to call it.
Well, as someone who identifies as an engineer, is that
evolutionary, Incomplete by definition way of behaving,
difficult for your brain? No.
No, you like it that way. I like that way because as an
engineer you've got to build newthings and you've got to reverse
(27:22):
engineer things and you got to take them down to the beginning
and build them back up again andbuild them better.
So that's that's something that I feel like I can be
comfortable. With OK that's cool.
I feel like engineers are maybe attracted to fewer open system
problems, but maybe I'm working off of a stereotype.
Maybe I I'm I'm definitely not opposed to them.
(27:44):
I think maybe it was the dive into climate engineering at an
early stage and realizing it's crazy and exciting and a real
opportunity and there's no easy way forward.
OK, fair enough. Regarding 6.21 of the old fights
about it, I'm pretty sure they fixed it at this point.
But there was an accounting issue where countries like
(28:07):
Brazil that were net removing from forestry were wanting to
sell forestry credits but also not deduct the carbon off of the
carbon accounting balance sheet.So they would still remain a
carbon negative country even though they were selling real
interest in the carbon negativity.
Was that ever fixed, you know? Don't know, but that's very
(28:30):
clearly a problem. So I'm hoping so.
I mean, I feel like the corresponding adjustments came
in to mitigate that problem exactly.
Again, this is something that wesee in the voluntary market with
some people who sell products that then get to claim that
they're carbon neutral when they're not because they haven't
sold the credits into it. So it's a problem we've seen in
the BCM space and we're able to mitigate that with clear
(28:53):
reporting or registries and better, you know, tagging of, of
credits and, and, and where theygo on that side of things.
So in the same way with 6.2, thecorresponding adjustments have
come in as a mechanism that allows the host country, one
that is creating the carbon arrival to subtract the CO2 from
their national Ledger and then the buying company is able to
(29:18):
add it to their Ledger. So well, what this all comes
down to is just transparency of countries and them clearly
working with the supplier on, onthe host side to make it really
clear, working as well with the registry partner, whoever the
supplier is working with to be very transparent and really
clear about all of that. So I'm hoping that problems been
fixed and you know that that otherwise we got some problems
(29:41):
ahead. Why now?
Is there some sort of deadline coming up for getting these
deals done? Is it just it finally
materialized? Why is this happening right now?
Yeah. I mean for us, we are a European
company and we've got a big basein Zurich and in Paris as well.
(30:02):
But with that being in Zurich and and being in Switzerland, we
are able to work with a lot of iron actors who have been
interested in this for a while and have been really been been
having all the kernels, you know, of.
This is something that we want to do makes sense for us as
Switzerland. We need to work with a country
where we already have bilateral agreements in place.
(30:23):
Norway is a clear, a clear option for that with with what's
already been laid down. So the kernels have all been
been, you know, pre popping in in different places.
And I think it made a lot of sense to bring these different
actors who have interests but aren't able to go the whole way
alone or, you know, have some hesitancy to engage in the first
(30:46):
mission alone to bring them together in this evolution of
buyers, which we did. So by bringing all these these
actors together, there's almost it's another way to de risk.
No, it's, it's more support coming together for this
transaction and it's, it's something then that is, is
allows the host country, I'm sorry, the buying country,
Switzerland in this case, who really approve it is like these
(31:08):
are Swiss buyers where's we're the Swiss company, this Swiss
government even we this is something we really want to
recognize as a real opportunity for us as a country.
So that was all happening with the buyers and, and the
government, anything for us justbeing that facilitator and being
someone that can provide the duediligence against, you know, a
(31:32):
framework that we feel really strongly about and unpacking
these risks from carbon to delivery to beyond carbon.
And then as well-being someone who has done a lot of
contracting for Cdr, Cdr purchases.
It really felt like this was an innovative opportunity for us to
be able to get more informed by what was happening at this, this
(31:53):
this list school lands working with these actors.
But I think it's it's less about, hi, I'm going to say
something that I feel like everyone always says.
So I apologize, but it's why now?
But why not now? We have the buyers, we have the
suppliers, we have credits, you know, that can be available in
(32:13):
the next few years. It made a lot of sense.
And yeah, I think for us, we felt like we were the right
people to get involved, to help facilitate involved.
I would have been quicker with awitty remark, but it broke my
brain a little bit. I think it's several reasons why
not now, but whatever, I don't know.
(32:33):
Well, maybe just the European context.
There's so much policy activity happening in Europe right now.
And I was also just reflecting alittle bit on how direct
procurement may affect the marketplace over there too, and
how that interacts with NBCS too.
So direct procurement happening in Germany, that's an
interesting case where German taxpayers pay directly for NDC's
(32:54):
for something that and Switzerland they had corporate
subsidy for. But maybe in Germany that's seen
in just as a internal subsidy for their carbon removal
industry. And maybe it's worth it for
economic development reasons more so than just meeting their
Article 6 obligations. I'm also just thinking about all
of the cap and trade markets that are getting set up right
now in places like Vietnam and China and of course Japan's GX
(33:18):
Lee coming online. I'm wondering if that's going to
see more of these types of country level deals taking
place. It's not just going to be
everyone in carbon removal thinks of Frontier in Microsoft
and Google and things like that.Five years from now, are we
going to be saying that countries are tending to be
involved in these deals? I mean, alternatively, we're
(33:38):
heading into a trade war environment where maybe there's
less international trade and people are like much more
protective of exporting their carbon removals.
I could see that happening as well.
What's your sense on on momentumin geopolitics?
No small questions here. Sorry, Victoria, good luck.
No, I mean my perspective on it is that there is going to be
(34:00):
motivation, interest at the bareminimum from many different
countries. I think Japan, as you said is a
great one that that that can getinvolved in this.
I think there are a few others such as Canada and you know even
Kenya who can like who want to be involved in this and who have
great resources and great projects to contribute.
So I think there are a lot of exciting opportunities and I
(34:22):
think ultimately, you know, there is a lot, you know, of
complexities around this discussion as can be seen in
this very confusing conversationthat we're having.
But now that we've done it, I think that it actually makes it
a lot easier. I think like we now have a
framework for how we can do this.
And we now have learnings from the first time.
(34:44):
And I think with each, as I've already said this, but with each
time it gets easier. And I think that the hurdle is
getting actors interested. And Microsoft and Frontier won't
be there forever, forever. But we're increasingly
understanding that this is goingto be a necessary part of our
future to some degree. And, and the motivation will not
(35:04):
always be there from governments, you know,
administrations and, and politics aren't there for
forever, but some of the risks that we're seeing are.
So I think that if we're able towithstand elections and we're
able to get past all that, I do think this motivation is going
to be there. And I, I think it's important
just to reflect and say like, it's, it's might seem more scary
(35:27):
than it is, but this is very similar to a lot of what we've
seen in the VCM around CDRS for recent years.
And it's, it's just a bit further, a bit more that needs
to be recognized at the nationallevel.
And if you're working with the right actors and you have the
right connections to these government officials, there's,
there's really a path to be trodden.
(35:47):
And it can be implemented relatively quickly and carefully
at the same time. What are you seeing from where
you said that someone working inCdr might not know about?
Interesting. Question Well, I think something
you know, I don't clarify in October and I've been in the
space for a long time as a researcher and risk.
(36:08):
So been a lot of looking at further documents and unpacking
the rest at the, the, the on thegrounds coming here.
The most interesting thing to meis understanding really a lot of
the commercial opportunities I'mgoing to call them the
contractual opportunities for buyers with yours buyers
(36:31):
engaging say can still really besmoothers can be, you know,
there's a lot to be built, there's a lot of opportunity
ahead and there's a lot of things around options.
And you know that meaning that you can buy CDRS today and you
can reserve options for future ventures of CDRS from the the
(36:53):
same developer and putting thoseterms into contracts and
understanding how to really scale up commitment with one
company, with a portfolio of companies with whatever it may
be. I think that that's so exciting
and it really paves the way for a lot of different, yeah, a lot
of it different opportunities for new actors, maybe smaller
(37:14):
actors to get involved if they can be an option for land and if
there is really a lot of innovation around that.
So options is really exciting. But beyond that there's right.
So first for few years, all these contractual things that
you can really like you can you can really step into the space
now, learn a lot. Do you risk these projects and
(37:35):
through these contractual mechanisms and do the due
diligence on the project seems fine, Joe Joe would skip what
step that and hopefully you know, that really supports the
scaring and in this early stage.So that's what's exciting me
right now. That's so funny that you went in
a direction of financial engineering and contracting and
(37:56):
legal as a realm for innovation.I I might have expected you to
to look elsewhere. Why that they're not?
But you're not a you're not a lawyer like business law person
by by trade. I think there's a lot of
exciting things around these technologies.
You know, there's a lot of innovations and cost
optimizations. We're seeing really innovative
(38:20):
methods of DAC or or of biochar,new methodologies on different
standards bodies that are reallyhelping, you know, mitigate some
of the risks, not all the risks,but some of the risks.
So we're seeing a lot of innovation on the technology
side. We've been seeing that for
years. So if we're going to want to
scale the market, I think, you know, this the whole chicken leg
thing that we always talk about,I think making it easier for
(38:42):
buyers to get in and making it exciting for them to get in is,
is, really is, is interesting. And that's, that's definitely
something that we, we really aimto provide by, you know, working
with them throughout all this and being that partner that can
do the end to end services so that they can benefit from the
opportunities of engaging in this new sector and can do it in
(39:05):
a way that, you know, hopefully is sustainable and, and at the
large scale, very equitable as well for every active involved.
What's next for Climify? Are you able to say much about
the deals you got in the pipeline or or something else?
Throw me a little tidbit here. Yeah.
So we are currently running or in the in the later stages of
(39:27):
running an RFP request for proposal for two Cdr buyers.
So these are large scale off takes for portfolios of projects
across durable Cdr pathways. So that will be an exciting
announcement later this year once it's all announced and you
(39:47):
know, gone through the due diligence and the contracting
and and all that fun stuff. And so that's something to look
out for. But on a more near term note, we
have AQ 2 market report coming out this week so that we'll have
all the all the insights on all the big buys of the last year,
all the big policy movements. But this year as well, what
(40:10):
we've done is. A a bit on what does it look
like if we take Microsoft out ofthe equation as well.
So I think that that's a an interesting one to look at.
So what? Does it look like, I mean
there's increasingly dominant atthis point, but can you say
anything about the trends that happen if you remove Microsoft
from the equations? Yeah.
I mean the it's, it's still a positive sign in terms of what
(40:32):
engagements look like for the quarter.
So I think that that's that's the the key take away.
I think it's, it's not just one actor that are other actors and
it's across pathways as well. It's it's not just in one area.
So we're still seeing the portfolio develop, which is all
good science. My default lately has been much
(40:53):
more pessimistic than I used to be.
Am I wrong? Can you can you talk me into
optimism? OK, yes, I'm way too optimistic
sometimes to a default. I'll meet you in the middle,
like trying like a little bit closer.
OK. What should be optimistic about
(41:14):
not only do we have Article 6.2 deals now happening and really
this motivation on the international market, we have
new buyers enter entering the space.
I think a number of new large scale deals that happened in the
last quarter, you know, new companies coming through, wild
assets being won and more, more developments happening with
projects, you know, big innovative projects such as Deep
(41:39):
Sky in Canada moving forward andgetting sat instead of
construction registries having first of a kind issuance under
new methodologies. I mean that to me keeps me
going. It's exciting to see it's it's
AI think more people trying these methodologies and seeing
where to learn. I think that that's really
exciting. So ways to be optimistic is that
(42:01):
the policy is moving forward, the targets are scaling,
issuance and retirement is happening, new buyers are coming
in. I think we're building a market
and we're building the foundations right now.
And I think that that's really exciting.
But again, that's overly optimistic on my side
potentially. Is solar radiation management
(42:22):
coming? Well, I think it's going to, I
think it's going to have to, at this stage, you know, we can't,
we can't ignore it. I think, you know, we just, I'm
sitting in the UK, my colleaguesare in Europe.
We just had an intense heat wave.
We've got another 1 coming this week.
(42:44):
That is not something to be optimistic about.
But I, I think that let's see what happens.
I don't think it's happening this decade, but we, we know
that there's some great people working on it and doing some
exciting research. So again, these guards are in
place, they're doing it in the right way.
They're having community engagement.
They're having that sort of development.
I think I'm right. Why not?
(43:05):
I'm seeing more people talk about that openly.
For a while it was much more theoretical, and now it's doing
much more. Like we're so deep in the
overshoot that it's almost an issue of when, not if.
Yeah, To me, I find it so crazy that when I first joined the Cdr
space and was talking about it in a research lens, like you
couldn't mention Geo engineering.
(43:25):
You had to organize arenas wherepeople had to like have
personas, they couldn't say they're a part of specific
company. Like the we, we really just
couldn't say things. And now we're at a stage where
we're like or not, you want to be a buyer, you want to be a
supplier, like let's go. So yeah, I think it's, I think
it's probably easier to talk about.
And that should, yeah, idea. Yeah, I I told this on a show
(43:48):
that hasn't been released yet, but has already been recorded.
So it's not like it's weird timeloop problem, but we were
talking about this where when I started in fiber removal was
about 8 years ago. You said your, your 5, five
years. OK, So eight years ago was still
like Cdr was still like, I see David Keith as being that for
(44:09):
intellectual godfather who's, who's like the main person in
both of those fields and major capacities.
Like, and now it's funny to see,it's kind of like creeping back
and we're, we're now we're like,OK, we're now a part of the
climate intervention crew. I mean, there definitely is no
denying it. We're all a little bit crazy and
that's OK. But I think it's nice that
carbon removal is kind of like this bucket of exciting
(44:31):
opportunities, as I said, and anengineer, I think that bringing
nature and type together is awesome if we do it in the right
way. So a bit of craziness managed is
not too bad. Oh man, I don't even know what
to say about it. It's it's intellectually
stimulating, emotionally, spiritually, I don't know, look
like I messed up my hair saying it.
(44:52):
That's how strongly I feel aboutit.
Victoria, thank you Bert for sharing.
I appreciate your thoughts on all of what's happening with 6.2
Article 6 in the Paris Agreement.
Just generally, thanks for helping explain that to people.
I'm a big fan of Climathi think you guys put out amazing written
content. I always make sure to read those
when they come out, so thanks for working on that.
(45:12):
Thanks for the thought leadership and thanks for doing
such amazing deals.
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