State of Voluntary Carbon Markets 2009 Report launched

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We are delighted to report that this year’s State of the Voluntary Carbon Markets 2009 report and executive summary are now available for you to download from our website, www.EcosystemMarketplace.com.

Click below for highlights

• The voluntary carbon markets nearly doubled in size and more than doubled in value between 2007 and 2008, from 65 million tonnes of credits traded worth US$331 million in 2007 to 123 million tonnes worth $705 million in 2008.
• While the OTC market grew by 26% between 2007 and 2008, most of the markets’ 2008 volume growth was due to trading volume the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX)– a clear break from the trend in past years, when the OTC drove most of voluntary market growth. Trading volume on the CCX more than tripled between 2007 and 2008.
• The average credit price increased 20% to $7.34/tonne on the OTC Market, though credits still covered a wide range of prices from $1.20/t to $46.90/t. CFI prices on the CCX varied widely in 2008, from a low of $0.95/t to a high of $7.40/t. The traded volume-weighted average CFI price in 2008 was $4.43/t.
• Asia sourced more traded credits on the OTC than any other region (45%). The U.S., however, supplied more credits into the OTC market than any other country (28%).
• The most popular project types (by transaction volume) in 2008 were renewable energy projects (51%), mostly hydro, wind, and biomass. Landfill gas was also a popular project type, claiming 16% of transaction volume.
• Third-party verification increased even beyond last year’s impressive 87%. At least 96% of credits were third-party verified in 2008. As was the case in 2007, leading the pack in terms of transaction volume in 2008  was the Voluntary Carbon Standard (48%), followed by the Gold Standard (12%) and the Climate Action Reserve (10%).
• Though investment and resale grew in importance as motivations for buying voluntary offsets in 2008, CSR and PR * remained the most important drivers for customers, according to credit suppliers.

Nearly 200 credit suppliers, registries, and exchanges provided data for this year’s report, providing more data points than ever before. This report is freely available only because of the generosity of our top sponsors Evolution Markets, TZ1, and JP Morgan and our sponsors TUV SUD, Baker & McKenzie, GE/AES Greenhouse Gas Services, MF Global, Karbone, and Essent Trading.

Check out the report for more analysis of these and other topics of the voluntary carbon markets.
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