The Government of Guyana is seeking proposals for transactions of ART-TREES certified carbon credits in advance of moving ahead with the plan to market the environmental services that the country’s forests are providing.
A request for proposals posted to the Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDs) website says that the deadline for submission is March 14, 2021.
“On October 26, 2021, the Architecture for REDD+ Transactions (ART) Secretariat, approved TREES (The REDD+ Environmental Excellence Standard) Documents Submitted by Guyana. Verification and Validation processes are currently being conducted. TREES is the standard under which Guyana’s carbon credits are being registered and certified for transaction in a carbon market. Since October 2021, these documents have been posted publicly on the ART Registry and include a TREES Registration Document and TREES Monitoring Report for the 2016-2020 Crediting Period and a TREES Registration Document for the 2021-2025 Crediting Period,” the document read.
Carbon credits are referred to as “hall passes” greenhouse gas emissions. Forests serve as carbon sinks and with approximately 85% of its landmass covered in forests coupled with a low deforestation rate, Guyana is looking to further market its carbon absorption capabilities.
Guyana alone stores about 19.5 billion tonnes of carbon in its forests that are estimated to be valued at US$40 billion to US$54 billion annually, according to President Irfaan Ali.
Now, with the sale of carbon credits, Guyana is aiming to earn significant sums from its carbon storage potential. By purchasing carbon credits, companies and governments with high CO2 emission rates are granted permission to generate one tonne of CO2 emissions per credit.
The sale of carbon credits is not a foreign concept to Guyana since it had the second-largest such agreement with Norway under the Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS) piloted by Jagdeo. Under that carbon credit agreement, Guyana earned over US$212 million which was used for various transitional projects.
However, it is unclear how Guyana’s carbon credits will stand up on the market given that it is now a fossil fuel producer and contributing to global emissions. The authorities have been shying away from addressing this concern.
Climate change specialist Kevin Hogan, attached to the Office of the President, recently told the international oil and gas conference that Guyana is looking to market at least 8 million carbon credits in the first round.
“We expect Guyana…will be able to issue about eight to 10 million (carbon) credits in the early days of ART-TREES [Architecture for REDD+ Environmental Excellence Standard]. We hope to issue a lot more in future years as certain uncertainty and complicated mathematical formulae drop away after the market matures, but in the early days, about eight to 10 million carbon credits,” he had said.
Guyana is hoping to complete ART-TREES certification no later than August 2022 after which it would have credits available on the market. Once the credits are certified, the ART-TREES Secretariat will record them on the publicly accessible ART registry, from which point they will be available for purchase by governments or companies with high emissions which they want to offset.
And when the credits are available for sale, these can be sold on the market, either directly by Guyana or through brokers.
