Integrated Assessment for Article 6 (IAA6)

Carbon markets have the potential to facilitate more ambitious climate action through cost-savings and targeted channelling of financial resources. However, countries are lacking the technical capacities to easily assess how Article 6 can be aligned with a broad set of goals. This includes climate and development priorities as well as avoiding any environmental and social harm.

To develop the required knowledge and capacity, the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Climate Action (DG CLIMA) is funding the Integrated Assessment for Article 6 (IAA6) Project. It will adopt South-South cooperation for the iterative co-development of an integrated assessment approach to Article 6 (IAA6 approach) to enable evidence-based policy making and implementation of Article 6 carbon markets in Peru, Sri Lanka and Tanzania. Utilizing this approach, the project supports countries in analysing and planning for domestic mitigation strategies with Article 6 cooperation that align with the countries’ Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the long-term goals of the Paris Agreement.

The project is steered by a Project Coordination Committee (PCC) composed of representatives from the European Commission, UNEP, UNOPS, and UNEP-CCC. It is implemented by UNEP Copenhagen Climate Centre (UNEP-CCC), jointly with selected implementation partners from the Global South.

The project aims to catalyse broader deployment of the tools and approaches regionally and globally.

Specific project activities and impacts include:

1) Developing an approach for integrated assessment to devise and implement countries’ Article 6 strategies (IAA6 approach). This builds on Costa Rica’s experiences and the SiSePuede open-source modelling framework, among other publicly available resources, drawing on standardised data structures. The approach is a practical framework to build capacities and enable comprehensive implementation of Article 6 by providing access to tools and guidance material.

2) Working with Peru, Tanzania and Sri Lanka to co-develop and pilot the IAA6 approach. The project will engage with key stakeholders in all three countries to identify needs, gather contextual information and data, and define how to best structure the implementation process. Afterwards, components will be collaboratively refined to suit the country-specific requirements. This will help to continuously improve the approach and ensure its context-sensitivity. Specific outcomes from the implementation process may include the utilization of international open-source data to develop local climate action models and modelling capacities. Another example is the design of advanced procedures for holistic climate policy co-creation.

3) Facilitating regional and global knowledge sharing, communication, and outreach. The project will publicly share tools and country activities, socialize lessons learned (at regional and global UNFCCC events), and conduct a needs assessment for a wider deployment.

The development of the IAA6 approach complements existing UNEP-CCC initiatives on capacity building and analysis for Article 6 implementation. This includes the analysis of carbon market developments (Pipelines for the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and Article 6), impact assessment tools for sustainable development (Sustainable Development Initiative for Article 6) and transformational change as part of the Initiative for Climate Action Transparency (ICAT), as well as piloting of Article 6 activities, such as the Supporting Preparedness for Article 6 Cooperation (SPAR6C) project.

The final version of the IAA6 approach, incorporating lessons learned from country applications, will be made available and will be linked here.

During COP28, the IAA6 project organized an event focusing on carbon market standards and capacity needs in countries along with representatives from Peru, Sri Lanka and Tanzania. Watch the recording here.

Watch this UNEP video for a short introduction to Article 6 carbon markets:

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