Carbon Offsets

Clients Across Industries

Our carbon offsets team advises on complex matters across industries, with particular experience helping businesses that have high exposure in a carbon-constrained economy. We advise major U.S. and international producers, private investment funds, midstream companies, international conglomerates, independent commodity trading houses and liquefied natural gas (LNG) project developers and customers.

From asset managers seeking carbon offsets policy and regulatory counseling, emerging technology companies financing deals through the securitization of carbon credits, to governments and other entities pushing to reform policy, our clients hail from virtually every sector and area of the economy. We represent clients in technology, private equity and other investment funds, financial services, energy and renewable energy, aerospace and defense and infrastructure and transportation, among others.

Services In-Depth

Our cross-disciplinary approach to carbon offsets matters spans the spectrum—from advising on transactional and corporate matters to regulatory and policy counseling. Our carbon offsets team includes lawyers and advisors from Akin's corporate, environmental, regulatory, commodities, trading and derivatives, public law and policy, ESG, climate change and sustainability, energy transition, investment management and projects & energy transition practices, among others. In recent years, carbon offsets have become trading vehicles and correlated with job creation and health benefits from reduced emissions. As such, market participants are presented with myriad opportunities in addition to challenges.

Akin’s carbon offsets practice has experience advising on the full scope of matters, including as related to the:

• Wide range of corporate matters, including the reporting of carbon offsets.
• Transactions involving methodologies and standards, including Verra, U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), Verified Carbon Standard (VCS), California Compliance Offsets Program, Gold Standard (GS), Climate Action Reserve (CAR), American Carbon Registry (ACR), Quebec Offset Crediting Mechanism and the Royal Bank of Canada (RBC).
• Co-attributes and advising on matters involving the additionality, permanence and leakage characteristics of carbon offsets.
• Paris Agreement advice and counseling, including issues surrounding Article 6.
• Sourcing of carbon credits.
• Exchange-traded products securitized by carbon credits and ESG products.
• Commoditization of tranches of carbon offsets.
• Carbon accounting rule, third-party certifications and validation processes.
• International trade of carbon credits, including country to country.
• Carbon-neutral, solar/wind, hydro, biofuels, nature-based projects and socially oriented projects (e.g., cookstove projects).
• Stacking of environmental and social attributes consistent with the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
• Governmental entities setting up carbon credit cashing programs.
• Structuring and formation of investment management funds focusing on carbon credits.
• Advertising and marketing issues, including Federal Trade Commission (FTC) enforcement actions.
• Compliance with emission standards, including requirements under the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA).

Regulatory, Public Law and Policy

Further setting us apart in the market are our powerhouse regulatory and public law and policy practices, which are highly involved in carbon offsets counseling and rulemaking. Akin is renowned for having numerous former members of Congress and senior regulators spread across industry groups. We have significant experience in and relationships with all three branches of the U.S. government, as well as the United Nations, including the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

In addition to our extensive understanding of the carbon markets and related registries, we track regulatory and policy developments globally and advocate on behalf of clients before the UNFCCC and the convention of the party processes, multilateral environmental treaty secretariats, the World Bank, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and other international forums. Further, our lawyers apply their extensive experience and knowledge with the World Trade Organization (WTO) and related U.S. and multilateral institutions, trade regulations, carbon border adjustment measures, clean technology transfer and financing mechanisms.