Article 6: how to scale the ITMO market
Join us to explore the crucial role of ratings in scaling the market for Internationally Transferred Mitigation Outcomes (ITMOs) under Article 6. Following our recent report ‘To Baku and beyond: scaling Article 6 carbon markets with integrity’, this session will delve into the key elements for assessing whether an ITMO is Paris-aligned. Our panellists include Sebastien Cross, Chief Innovation Officer and Co-founder at BeZero Carbon, Axel Michaelowa, Senior Founding Partner at Perspectives Climate Group and Alexandra Soezer, Director at the Climate Action Centre of Excellence. They will be exploring the essential elements that could contribute to the integrity and effectiveness of ITMOs, including:
NDC ambition and performance
The characteristics and carbon accounting practices underlying the ITMO.
Whether the ITMO contributes to overarching goals of the Paris Agreement both to support global decarbonisation and sustainable development.
With the operationalisation of Article 6 labelled as a key priority for COP29, discussions of how to deliver Paris-aligned ITMOs are becoming increasingly pertinent. Ratings will have a key role to play in holding market participants accountable for delivering tangible climate impacts.
Please note this webinar will be recorded. If you are not able to attend, please register and the recording will be sent to you after the event.
Moderator:
Lily Ginsberg-Keig, Policy Manager, BeZero Carbon
Lily Ginsberg-Keig is Policy Manager at BeZero Carbon, a global carbon credit ratings agency, focusing on carbon markets regulation across the Voluntary Carbon Market, Compliance Schemes and Article 6. Lily has experience working with governments in both the private and public sector. Lily previously worked at Arup advising local and national governments on their climate action plans and prior to this, she worked for the UK Government as an adviser to the Minister for the Environment.
Speakers:
Sebastien Cross, Co-Founder and Chief Innovation Officer, BeZero Carbon
Sebastien is Chief Innovation Officer and Co-Founder of BeZero Carbon, a global ratings agency for carbon markets. BeZero Carbon was founded in 2020 and its global team combines expertise within climate and earth science, financial research, data science, and public policy.Prior to founding BeZero Carbon, he worked as a Rates Strategist for Bank of America, focusing on fixed-income markets. He began his career as an Economist at the Bank of England. He has an MSc in Finance & Economics from Warwick Business School and an MA in Economics from the University of Sheffield.
Axel Michaelowa, Senior Founding Partner, Perspectives Climate Group
Axel Michaelowa has a PhD in Economics and has worked on international climate policy instruments and the UNFCCC process since 1994. He is senior founding partner of Perspectives, and part-time researcher at the Institute of Political Science of the University of Zurich. Axel consults private, governmental and public institutions on international carbon markets and the design of domestic climate policy instruments and has written more than 400 research articles and studies on these topics. Axel is a member of the roster of experts of the Article 6.4 Supervisory Body. Between 2006 and 2013, he served on the CDM Registration and Issuance Team of the CDM Executive Board; he was member of the board of the Climate Cent Foundation between 2005 and 2009. Axel has done capacity building on carbon markets and carbon pricing in over 40 developing countries, ranging from Algeria to Yemen. He worked on 10 approved baseline methodologies and three approved standardized baselines under the CDM. In South East Asia and South Asia, Axel has been working intensively since the late 1990s on capacity building for the CDM, design of nationally appropriate mitigation actions, Article 6 piloting and linking of international carbon markets with Just Energy Transition Partnerships.
Dr. Alexandra Soezer, Director, Climate Action Center of Excellence
Alexandra Soezer is Director, GORD Climate Action Center of Excellence, focusing on advancing the goals of the Paris Agreement through international cooperation and innovative carbon market mechanisms.
Alexandra Soezer's most recent role was as the United Nations Development Program's as expert in climate change mitigation, and carbon finance where she worked in different roles for 15 years. In 2021, she set up Carbon Payment for Development, UNDP’s dedicated programme on Paris-aligned carbon markets, funded by Switzerland with the objective, to enhance countries readiness to engage in cooperative approaches under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement. Previously, Alexandra worked with MDG Carbon, UNDP’s corporate framework for carbon finance and UNDP’s National Determined Contributions Support Programme, building on her experience that she gained at the Austrian JI/CDM Programme, managed by Kommunalkredit on behalf of the Austrian Government.
Alexandra earned her PhD in Environmental Sciences at the University of Applied Life Sciences, Vienna, Austria and the Austrian Institute of Technology with a specialization on fluctuating micro-climatic stresses on plants.