Airline trade group IATA hinted that it could withdraw support for the United Nations-sanctioned carbon-offset scheme known as Corsia, due to inaction and opposition from participating nation states.
Corsia (Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation) was initially approved by the International Civil Aviation Organization, the UN's aviation arm, in 2016. Under its provisions, airlines have to offset international flight emissions in excess of 85% of their 2019 level.
At issue, though, is what IATA says is large shortfall of approved carbon offsets, known as Eligible Emissions Units (EEUs), which must be authorized by each country in which a benefitting climate project is located.
The trade group says that thus far just 10 nations have made EEUs available, with Guyana being the clear global leader. Combined, those countries have put 38 million EEUs on the market this year, while airline demand to meet their CORSIA commitments is 213 million units.
"It's actually in the hands of governments," IATA director general Willie Walsh said at the trade group's Annual General Meeting earlier this month in Rio de Janeiro. "If Corsia fails, it won't fail because airlines didn't buy the units. It will fail because units weren't made available by the governments that actually committed to the Corsia agreement."
The creation of EEUs is a multi-step bureaucratic project. To ensure they will only be awarded for projects with real emissions benefits -- for example, a rainforest preservation project in Guyana -- carbon-credit allowances are vetted through a structured process of third-party validators. Then, before they can be placed on Corsia's EEU market, they must be formally authorized by the country in which the associated project is located.
The authorization process is designed to guarantee those same credits haven't already been allocated toward other climate goals and commitments, such as the Paris Accords.
A challenge for airlines is that some countries may choose to prioritize Paris Accord commitments over their Corsia ones. And more direct challenges are in the works from the European Commission, which is contemplating designating all existing EEUs as insufficiently beneficial in offsetting airline emissions and therefore ineligible as carbon credits in the EU.
Walsh accused the EU of attempting to undermine Corsia in order to support its own European Trading System cap-and-trade scheme.
"Many of you have questioned our continuing support for an expensive system that will likely fail because of the action and inaction of the governments that designed it," he said. "I will leave that question for my successor but will not be surprised if we see a change in direction."