STRENGTHENING THE CARBON MARKET FOR CLEAN COOKING

CCA and partners are building greater trust in clean cooking carbon projects.

For carbon markets to continue boosting sector investment, they must be based on sound data and methodologies – and they must deliver on their promises.

Two important sector initiatives, both led by CCA, are helping to strengthen climate finance, enabling the integrity, transparency, fairness, and sustainability the clean cooking carbon market needs to thrive:

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CLEAN COOKING AND CLIMATE CONSORTIUM (4C)

4C brings together expert partners to support efforts to achieve climate goals through cooking energy interventions. The consortium consists of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Berkeley Air Monitoring Group, CCA, the Climate and Clean Air Coalition, the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) secretariat.

4C is leading a sector-wide effort to develop a new carbon methodology for crediting emissions reductions from cooking projects. To do this, 4C is tapping into the increasing quantity and quality of existing cooking-specific data, as well as the expertise of the clean cooking sector. More than 250 researchers, project developers, and other partners have weighed in on the process.

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4C intends for the new methodology to become the standard methodology used under the voluntary carbon market and the Paris Agreement, including:

Article 6.2, which allows countries to trade emission reductions and removals with one another.
Article 6.4, which creates a global carbon market, overseen by the United Nations, through which project developers can register their credits for purchase.

The 4C methodology is the first to cover all cooking transition scenarios, meaning it can be used for all types of cooking stoves and fuels. This comprehensive approach eliminates the need for other cooking project methodologies, thereby simplifying the market for everyone, improving verification processes, and incentivizing best practices. To ensure that its methodology remains up to date and accessible to carbon project developers, 4C members CCA and SEI are currently building a free online platform that brings together key data on clean cooking projects.

4C is also supporting research on the most important data that needs to go into the methodology. One key parameter is the fraction of non-renewable biomass (fNRB), which measures how much more wood is harvested beyond what an ecosystem can grow back. Correct fNRB values are crucial for accurately estimating the emissions reduced by clean cooking. Leading researchers at SEI and the Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) have worked with UNFCCC to update outdated fNRB values with more realistic, granular data and, with CCA’s support, are adding more local context. Initial research using global data will be complemented by data that is location-specific and takes into account how trees are used in particular areas. For example, fruit trees are generally not harvested for cooking. In other areas, wood may be heavily harvested for uses other than cooking, such as producing tea or tobacco, or fueling a kiln.

“The sector requires the latest scientific information to be harmonized, and it requires unified approaches that are endorsed by subject matter experts and leading standards bodies. Adopting consensus-based approaches where knowledge gaps exist is crucial to achieving this harmonization.”
_{^{–Vikash Talyan, Senior Director, Standard Development and Innovation, Gold Standard}}

Another key parameter for clean cooking carbon projects is fuel consumption, best measured through the Kitchen Performance Test (KPT). This test involves daily measurements of the amount of fuel used across several days in the user’s kitchen. While KPTs may have high associated costs and do not solve issues relating to social desirability bias, where households may alter their behavior in the presence of project staff, well-performed KPTs are the most reliable method for capturing total household fuel consumption, including stacking (concurrent use of multiple stoves). As part of its in-progress methodology, 4C will promote KPTs as a best practice.

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT: BURN MANUFACTURING

BURN conducts four-day KPTs for all of its most recent cooking carbon projects, and then triangulates the adoption and usage rates from its KPT samples with telephone surveys and in-person household visits, enabling ground-proofed data to be validated by independent auditors. Learn more here.

RESPONSIBLE CARBON FINANCE FOR CLEAN COOKING INITIATIVE

To build buyers’ confidence in clean cooking carbon projects, CCA set out to collaboratively create a set of principles that anyone participating in the markets could follow. CCA led consultations with 537 people from 267 institutions and incorporated relevant methodological work by 4C to design principles covering four themes: integrity, transparency, fairness, and sustainability.

Following the consultations, the Interim Principles for Responsible Carbon Finance in Clean Cooking were posted online for public comment, and CCA is now using the feedback to create the final set of principles. The final product will be a voluntary Code of Conduct for responsible carbon finance. CCA will help project developers adopt this Code of Conduct and encourage buyers to look for it, as a hallmark of a high-quality, clean cooking carbon project. The code will be revised, as needed, based on the latest science, to continuously increase the quality of projects, improve market norms, instill confidence in clean cooking carbon markets, and incentivize investment.

CCA is simultaneously promoting responsible carbon finance and helping buyers understand that measuring emissions reductions from cooking projects is inherently difficult. Collecting the on-the-ground data that ensures accuracy is expensive. A selling price of $4–7 per ton of CO2e limits the potential of clean cooking carbon markets. As buyers rightly continue to push for high-quality and trusted projects, so must the market price reflect that quality.

The carbon market could help mobilize the funding necessary to bring clean cooking access to all who lack it. This is a critical time to solidify a clean cooking carbon market built on integrity, transparency, fairness, and sustainability, and to pave the way for even greater climate action.