The European Commission proposal, if approved by EU countries and lawmakers, would lay the groundwork for a government-approved certificate for carbon removals.
While some voluntary certification schemes already exist, allowing project developers to sell carbon removals credits to companies seeking to offset their emissions, Brussels wants to create a more widely used and trusted standard. The EU proposal said existing certification schemes will be able to win EU approval if they meet certain criteria, including by addressing the risk that the CO2 could be released back into the atmosphere and having transparent rules on how long the CO2 will be stored.
The U.N. climate science panel has said scaling up CO2 removals is "unavoidable" if the world is to limit global warming to 1.5C. But removals remain controversial, and have been criticised by campaigners as a way for companies to avoid cutting their emissions, while buying CO2 removal credits or investing in technologies that promise to remove CO2 in future.
What’s the point when peoples’ fuel bills are soaring and China and India belch out fumes from coal fired power stations ! I mean yes let’s reduce emissions but ONLY when the largest emitters agree too