NEA grows potential whitelist of carbon credits with new MOUs

SINGAPORE’S National Environment Agency (NEA) has inked separate memoranda of understanding (MOUs) with two more international offset programmes, widening its potential whitelist of carbon-credit certifiers and issuers.

The latest additions are the American Carbon Registry (ACR) and the Architecture for REDD+ Transactions (ART), NEA said in a LinkedIn post. Last year, NEA signed separate MOUs with Gold Standard and Verra – two of the world’s biggest international carbon-offset standard programmes.

Like Gold Standard and Verra, ACR and ART are internationally recognised offset programmes accepted by the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (Corsia), which was developed by the International Civil Aviation Organization.

The latest MOUs give Singapore-based companies more options when acquiring eligible high-quality carbon credits to offset up to 5 per cent of their taxable emissions from 2024.

They also detail the terms of cooperation between NEA and the two carbon credit providers to help Singapore companies exercise this option through the purchase and retirement of ACR and ART-issued TREES (The REDD+ Environmental Excellence Standard) credits.

In January this year, Verra came under scrutiny after The Guardian reported that more than 90 per cent of its approved rainforest carbon-offset credits were “phantom credits”.

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Verra disputed the report in strong terms.

The report was the result of a nine-month investigation by The Guardian, German weekly Die Zeit and non-profit investigative journalism organisation SourceMaterial.

The government said at the time that it will take into account the report as it finalises its criteria for credits that are eligible for carbon tax offsetting in the country. A whitelist of acceptable credits will be published later this year.