While many companies are looking to adjust their processes and reduce their environmental footprint through green innovation, there are many sectors in which these adjustments will not have a large enough impact to play their part in combating climate change. As such, these organizations have more recently begun turning to other ways to offset their environmental impact. One example of such an opportunity is the Voluntary Carbon Market.

The Voluntary Carbon Market (VCM) is a global network of companies, verifiers, not-for-profits, non-governmental organizations, and individuals who work together to help reduce global emissions and fund carbon capture initiatives. Through the VCM companies who are able to significantly offset their carbon emissions are able to receive financial benefit from their emissions offsetting, while companies who are looking to reduce their net carbon footprint are able to pay to assure that their emissions are offset through various carbon capture techniques. This significantly incentivizes the development of new carbon capture projects and technologies, and it allows climate conscious companies that are forced to emit carbon dioxide to reduce their environmental impact.

The VCM works through a multi-step process that starts with the capture of CO2 by an organization with carbon dioxide removal capacity. Following this capture, this organization will approach a carbon credit verifier with proof of their ability to capture carbon, and apply for crediting through one of the verifier’s carbon capture methodologies. Once this application is submitted, the verifier will review the information provided by the carbon capture organization and determine if the organization was able to properly capture carbon, and how much carbon they were able to capture. Once this has been determined, the verifier will issue the organization carbon credits, which they can then sell on a VCM registry to any company who hopes to offset their carbon emissions. As of 2023, carbon credits can cost anywhere from $10 per tonne of CO2 offset to over $80 per tonne of CO2 offset, with this range coming from the type of carbon offset being pursued, and the quality of the verification process that is used to validate the carbon offsets.

Overall, the VCM provides an important transactional platform through which companies can offset their inherent carbon emissions by helping to fund the development of carbon capture projects. While the VCM has been around for a while, it is still very much in its infancy, and many experts believe that the market could grow to upwards of $50 billion dollars by 2030.