Carbon Offset Projects: Compliance and Voluntary Market Approaches

Forest carbon offset projects appear in both compliance and voluntary carbon markets as avenues for emitters to purchase credits that offset some of their carbon emissions. Forest-based offset projects aim to increase carbon sequestration above business-as-usual levels in that forestland to reduce atmospheric carbon concentrations. This panel will speak to two distinct approaches to forest carbon offset projects in both of these markets, from the perspective of a large manager of working forestland engaged in 100-year contracts for carbon sequestration, and that of a technology-driven forest carbon marketplace based on bundled contracts of 1-year harvest deferrals.

Green Diamond Resource Company is a large landowner and timber manager in the western and southeastern US that has carbon projects in four states and engages with regulated compliance carbon markets as well as voluntary carbon markets.

Natural Capital Exchange (NCX) is a forest carbon marketplace that utilizes remote-sensing, AI, and robust forest datasets to open participation in voluntary carbon markets to landowners that face logistical and economic barriers to access in the compliance carbon market.