$370 million in credits registered in Alaska since 2015 By Sam Friedman
T
here’s money to be made in promising to reduce your company’s environmental footprint by cutting down fewer trees. And Alaska’s largest landowners are getting behind this new type of business in a big way. Alaska is now the largest producer of forestry carbon offsets for California’s greenhouse gas cap and trade program, despite qualifying to sell the credits years behind the contiguous United
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States. Thus far, four Alaska Native regional corporations and eight village corporations have received carbon offset credits through the program or have started the process of registering credits. At current prices of about $13 per offset credit, the carbon offsets registered in Alaska are worth about $370 million. And that’s just the initial carbon credits awarded for these projects. As forests continue to grow,
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they will produce a smaller number of new credits equal to the value of the carbon dioxide stored in the new growth compared to similar forestland outside the project. The new market created by California’s greenhouse gas rules opened to Alaska in 2015. It’s scheduled to partially close in 2021, with a new regulatory change that will cut demand for forestry credits produced in Alaska by 75 percent.
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ALASKA NATIVE SPECIAL SECTION
Harvesting Carbon Credits
