In Africa, Adapted Development Can Lead to Inclusion and Green Growth
If Africa stood still, it would need to adapt. But Africa is not standing still. Africa is poised on the cusp of develop...
Blog by Gareth Brydon Phillips
Emission reductions – going out of fashion?
Emission reductions are a major fixture in the lexicon of the climate change industry. Many of today’s climate change specialists cut their teeth on the Clean Development Mechani...
Carbon markets under a 2020 climate agreement
Developing countries must claim their share of atmospheric space Gareth Phillips is Chief Climate and Green Growth Officer at the African Development Bank and this blog is base...
Why INDCs Can Be A Firm Foundation To A Climate Deal
Gareth Brydon Phillips is Chief Climate and Green Growth Officer at the African Development Bank and this blog is based on an internal briefing note circulated to AfDB staff. You m...
Climate Change Policy: The First Air Grabs Are Under Way
Welcome to the age of the air grab. We are all familiar with the concept of the land grab, whether at a local or international level and history relates how armie...
What Might Carbon Markets Post 2020 Look Like?
“We are on the cusp of a very interesting period in the evolution of carbon markets” Post 2020 carbon markets are a very exciting space with much to contr...
Linking Emissions Trading Schemes Is Not A Viable Flexibility Mechanism
ABSTRACT. Emission Trading Schemes will soon become much less about trading and much more about implementing low carbon technology so that capped entities do not need to buy the al...
Why Europe Should Go For A Minus 50 Per Cent Climate Target
by Gareth Brydon Phillips The European Commission has set the ball rolling for Ban Ki Moon’s September climate summit with a 2030 target of 40 per cent below 1990, dropping membe...
The European Commission is taking a big gamble with the CDM
By Gareth Brydon Phillips Many of my colleagues in the climate investment space were shocked by the European Commission’s proposal to exclude international emission reductions fr...
Message to Regulators: Emissions Trading Schemes Can Do Wonders Provided They Have a Strong and Rising Forward Price Curve
By Gareth Brydon Phillips There is a general perception that the purpose of emission trading schemes is to reduce GHG emissions as cheaply as possible. This is not quite correct. I...
The Clean Development Mechanism and Joint Implementation – “has been” climate mechanisms or foundations of the fight against climate change?
By Gareth Phillips The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and Joint Implementation (JI) must feel like unloved offspring of the Kyoto Protocol, once billed as a significant part of ...
Technical Brief: Kick-Starting the Clean Development Mechanism, Part 2
Extend the concept of supplementarity such that both the use and the generation of emission reductions are supplemental to domestic action By Gareth Brydon Phillips In an article d...
Three days in Bonn, Doing Not Much
By Gareth Brydon Phillips Representatives of the countries that have signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change spent three days in Bonn last week, attendin...
What is going on with carbon prices?
Durban was a success (indeed a miracle from the perspective of what the world expected – i.e. very little – a few weeks before). But why have carbon prices continued to slide?...
Good-bye Annex 1 Non Annex 1, Hello Durban
On Friday December 9th a group of us went for dinner at a sushi bar in Durban. We were quite subdued and when a table at the other side of the restaurant started cheering, I said ...
China shoots foot; European Commission kills PoA; Panel strangles meth – it’s never boring
by: Gareth Phillips, Managing Director, Sustainability and Forestry Who would want to be on the supply side of CERs these days? Prices are at an all time low and for sure, some sup...
What could $1Bn buy in Indonesia’s forestry sector?
by: Gareth Phillips, Managing Director, Sustainability and Forestry The Norway – Indonesia REDD+ Partnership is a courageous move by one of the world’s wealthiest nations to pu...