Held in conjunction with the UN General Assembly, New York Climate Week (NYCW) brought together passionate individuals, policymakers, and innovators to tackle the urgent need for climate action. This year’s event centred on practical approaches for decarbonising industries that have traditionally been seen as hard-to-abate, showcasing the power of collaboration in driving meaningful change. Evident's Business Development Director, Travis Caddy, shares his reflections from the week, and what it means for the transition to a clean economy.

Among the 600 events, one of the key highlights was the Green Markets Day held at JP Morgan’s offices. Supported by major players like the Bezos Earth Fund, RMI, Mission Possible Partnership, and the Centre for Green Market Activation, it put a crucial tool front and centre: book and claim.

Book and claim is a market-based solution that allows the environmental attribute of a product to be separated from the physical commodity itself. This allows companies to purchase clean attributes, even if the actual green product is not physically available in their location, addressing significant challenges related to proximity and traceability. It’s a system designed to connect demand with supply in the most efficient way possible, which is especially critical for creating markets for solutions to hard-to-abate sectors.

One of the core messages throughout the day was that book and claim offers a pathway to cost parity for green commodities, much like what we’ve already seen with renewables. The success of Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) was referenced multiple times, highlighting that similar infrastructure and standards can be applied to other markets such as green steel, cement, concrete, and SAF. This system’s potential to unlock system challenges was further reinforced by an endorsement from the White House’s very own John Podesta, President Biden’s senior climate advisor.

At Green Markets Day, the importance of book and claim was emphasised through the experiences of key corporate players and alliances. Initiatives like the Sustainable Aviation Buyers Alliance (SABA) for Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) and Zero Emission Maritime Buyers Alliance (ZEMBA) for sustainable maritime fuels, as well as the Green Market Activation (GMA) Trucking for low-carbon road fuels, shared the power of multi-stakeholder engagement to aggregate demand and execute long-term offtake contracts. Active corporate buyers such as Meta and Amazon spoke about how book and claim allows them the initiative on Scope 3 emission reductions in advance of SBTi guidance that will better enable them to do direct procurement of green commodities in the future.

As the world’s leader in certification of the clean economy, Evident is ready to support the emergence of new green commodities by leveraging its registries and over 25 years of experience in building book and claim systems.