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Carbon Markets Initiative

Bringing Transparency and Integrity to Carbon Markets

The Challenges

The Voluntary Carbon Market (VCM) has the potential to drive meaningful climate action, from protecting forests to scaling carbon removal technologies. However, inconsistent standards, data opacity, and market fragmentation undermine its effectiveness. Buyers struggle to evaluate credit quality due to incomplete and inaccessible project data, while developers face conflicting and duplicative reporting demands. Verifiers, meanwhile, work with static, inconsistent datasets, making reliable assessments difficult. Without clear, standardized, and transparent information, the market remains high-risk and inefficient.

Our Work

RMI’s Carbon Markets Initiative (CMI) is tackling these challenges by bringing transparency and integrity to carbon markets. Through an open, standardized data framework and educational resources, CMI empowers stakeholders to navigate the carbon markets with confidence.

Strengthening Carbon Credit Data

Making carbon credit data more transparent, structured, and interoperable

RMI is leading efforts to standardize carbon credit data, ensuring that buyers, project developers, and registries have access to reliable, verifiable, and science-backed information throughout the credit lifecycle.

THINK: VCM Landscape Guide defines the current state of the VCM and action levers around data quality, access, and efficiency
DO: Creating an open-source framework for carbon credit data, inclusive of emissions and socio-environmental considerations, that captures the full depth and breadth of data across a credit life cycle
SCALE: Partnering with VCM products and service providers, like Centigrade, to implement RMI's carbon credit data framework
Co-leading the Carbon Data Open Protocol to drive industry-wide standardization and interoperability
Explore The Framework

Demystifying Carbon Markets

Helping buyers and other stakeholders navigate the complexity of the carbon markets.

Understanding which carbon credits provide real impact is daunting. RMI provides the knowledge, tools, and frameworks for data-informed purchasing decisions.

THINK: Buyers' Guide to Carbon Credit Data Quality helps buyers find, compile, and analyze carbon credit data to inform their purchases
DO: Designing interactive tables that show available credit types and issuance data, and providing explainers that elaborate on quality risks for specific credit types
SCALE: Scaling best practices in carbon credit purchases through virtual and in-person workshops
Explore The Tables

Collaborate

Join us in shaping a more trusted and transparent carbon market!

Email us as carbonmarkets@rmi.org

Videos and Events

General | September 19, 2025

Beyond the Ton: Documenting the Benefits to Communities and Ecosystems at the Heart of Carbon Projects

In this third and final session, we turn to the socio-environmental (SE) dimensions of carbon projects—highlighting how carbon finance can be a driver of community empowerment and ecological justice when benefits are properly measured, documented, and shared throughout the market. Through applied use cases, we’ll explore how robust SE data can help projects deliver equitable, durable impacts that go well beyond the ton. 

General | August 20, 2025

Webinar – Making Data Work for Carbon Markets: Real-World Applications of the Carbon Crediting Data Framework

In this session, you’ll hear directly from early users and project developers who are testing the CCDF against real-world carbon crediting projects. A panel of practitioners will share how structured, standardized, and digitized data adds credibility and impact to projects. It highlights both the opportunities and challenges of building a more transparency and interoperable VCM.  

General | May 24, 2024

Webinar – A Buyer’s Guide to Carbon Credit Data Quality

RMI and Climate Collective invite you to a webinar to introduce due diligence tactics that can help buyers find, compile, analyze, and test carbon crediting data with confidence. Join us to learn how to build a data package anchored to climate performance information and how to use this approach to find high-quality credits. We will also discuss how, when, and why a buyer should connect with various data actors in the VCM to secure, screen, and vet data about projects and credits.

Articles and Reports

Technical Explainer: Clean and Improved Cookstove Carbon Credits

RMI experts analyze market trends, quality criteria, and risk implications for improved cookstoves carbon credits.
Beyond the Ton: Documenting the Benefits to Communities and Ecosystems at the Heart of Carbon Projects

Discover our toolkit on how to integrate and measure all the socio-environmental benefits of a carbon credit project that are integral to credit design and quality but can’t be measured in tons of C02.

Technical Explainer: Carbon Credits for Improved Rice Cultivation

RMI experts analyze market trends, quality criteria, and risk implications to help voluntary carbon market stakeholders understand the new landscape of rice credits
Technical Explainer: Ozone-Depleting Substances Carbon Credits

RMI experts analyze market trends, quality criteria, and risk implications for ODS credits.

The Carbon Crediting Data Framework

The Carbon Markets Initiative (CMI) is launching the Carbon Crediting Data Framework (CCDF), a first-of-its-kind open-source framework that brings structure, clarity, and transparency to the data that defines carbon credits.
Bringing Order to Carbon Credit Data

Why we’re building an open, standardized framework to bring clarity to credit markets.
A Buyer’s Guide to Carbon Credit Data Quality

Introducing new tools for buyers to play an integral role in scaling a high-quality Voluntary Carbon Market
A Path through Carbon Markets Turmoil

For voluntary carbon markets, the best way ahead is to strengthen the integrity of data and processes. Here’s how.
Radical Transparency for Voluntary Carbon Markets

Announcing Centigrade, a new platform to dramatically grow the supply of quality, trustworthy carbon credits from RMI and Ripple
From Paper to People: Bringing Equity to Carbon Markets

To ensure the rights and needs of Indigenous peoples and local communities, we must look at the voluntary carbon market through an equity lens.
Beyond the Buzz: What Can Blockchain Do for Carbon Markets?

Blockchain can bring greater transparency and trust to the buying and selling of carbon credits.
Can We Count on Forest Carbon Credits?

Technologies including remote sensing and machine learning have a critical role to play in enhancing the quality of forest carbon credits and building trust in carbon credit supply.
How to Build a Trusted Voluntary Carbon Market

We must accelerate the supply of high-quality carbon credits. Here are three ways we can create a trusted voluntary carbon market.

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