The national greenhouse gas voluntary emission reduction trading (CCER) was restarted after seven years-on January 22, the launching ceremony of CCER was held in Beijing. Ding Xuexiang, Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of
the CPC Central Committee and Vice Premier of the State Council, attended the event and announced the launch of the national voluntary greenhouse gas emission reduction trading market. Among them, CNBM Green Energy Co., Ltd., as a specialized company engaged in carbon asset management and trading under CNBM Group, was approved to be one of the units participating in the first batch of demonstration transactions, and purchased 10,000 tons of certified voluntary emission reductions of forestry carbon sinks at the launching ceremony to serve CNBM Group's next active participation in the national carbon market. On the first day of
trading, the total turnover of CCER market was 375000 tons, with a total turnover of 23.835 million yuan, and the average price per ton was about 63.5 yuan. As an important supplement to carbon emission allowance trading (CEA)
, CCER constitutes a complete carbon trading system in China. Song Xiangqing, deputy dean of the Institute of Government Management of
Beijing Normal University, said in an interview with reporters that CCER covers more than 200 projects in three categories, namely, reduction, replacement and absorption, covering emission reductions in different fields and industries. As a result, enterprises will enter the CCER market more voluntarily, which will help to further improve China's carbon trading system, optimize the structure of carbon trading resources, improve the level of carbon trading, and gradually realize the integration with the international carbon trading market. Compared
with CEA, CCER highlights the word "voluntary". As early as 2012, China started the construction of CCER system, then started the filing in 2014, and officially started the trading mechanism in 2015. Then, due to the small trading volume and non-standard individual projects, CCER suspended the filing in March 2017, and since then, it has been absent from the construction of China's carbon trading system. The absence
of CCER has also led to the reduction of the liquidity of carbon emission rights and interests in China, and the decline of market activity and the enthusiasm of market participants. In this context, the restart of CCER has been put on the agenda to improve the relevant management methods, emission reduction accounting methods, project approval and the construction of transaction registration institutions.
For example, on June 27, 2023, the preliminary acceptance of the national greenhouse gas voluntary emission reduction registration system and trading system construction project prepared the infrastructure for the registration and online trading of CCER; On August 17 of the same year, the Beijing Green Exchange issued the Announcement on the Arrangement of Trading Related Services in the National Greenhouse Gas Voluntary Emission Reduction Trading System, announcing that the CCER system will open its account opening function from now on, and clarifying the important information such as the account opening subject and trading place of the national voluntary emission reduction trading. On October 19, 2023, the Ministry of
Ecology and Environment and the General Administration of Market Supervision jointly issued the Measures for the Management of Voluntary Greenhouse Gas Emission Reduction Trading (Trial Implementation) as a basic system to ensure the orderly operation of the CCER market, and on October 24, the first four methodologies of the CCER project were issued based on the system. Afforestation carbon sink, photothermal power generation, offshore wind power and mangrove construction.
With the gradual maturity of relevant conditions, CCER successfully ushered in the restart, and achieved a total trading volume of 375000 tons and a total turnover of 23.835 million yuan on the first trading day. In the future, with the maturity of trading, China's carbon market will usher in a golden period of accelerated development.
In Song Xiangqing's view, because CCER is a carbon asset formed by strict auditing and certification procedures in accordance with the voluntary emission reduction methodology of the National Development and Reform Commission, it has more trading potential, which will bring a new wind to China's carbon trading market, promote the rationalization of carbon trading prices, and promote the expansion of carbon trading scale and quality improvement.
In fact, CCER and CEA complement each other and constitute a complete carbon trading system in China. Among them, CEA has gone through 612 trading days since its launch in July 2021, with active market transactions, stable trading prices and stable market operation.
According to Oriental Wealth Choice statistics, CEA closed at 79.34 yuan/ton in 2023, up 44.3% in the whole year, breaking through the high of 80 yuan/ton in October. According to a recent report released by the
State Grid Energy Research Institute, China's carbon price will rise to the global average level (the EU-ETS trading price in the EU carbon market, which is currently the benchmark, is close to eight times China's carbon price). Many industry insiders predict that China's carbon price may run at the level of 100 yuan/ton in the next few years.
In addition, according to the statistics of Shanghai Environmental Energy Exchange, as of January 22, the cumulative turnover of CEA in the national carbon market was about 443 million tons, with a turnover of about 25.028 billion yuan.
With the restart of CCER, China's carbon market will also inject fresh "blood". Shi Yichen, a senior academic consultant at the International Institute of Green Finance, Central University of Finance and Economics, predicts that if China's carbon market expands to eight key emission control industries in an orderly manner, the total amount of carbon quotas in the market will reach 7 billion to 8 billion tons. If the current carbon market price of 70 yuan/ton is conservatively estimated, the demand for performance at the national level alone will bring more than 20 billion yuan of CCER market demand.
Beijing Green Exchange has publicly stated that if we refer to the trading scale of the EU carbon market in 2022, the annual trading volume of China's carbon market will exceed 10 billion tons, the trading price will exceed 100 yuan/ton, and the trading volume will exceed 1 trillion yuan.
