High-Integrity, High-Impact: France's Vision for an Effective Voluntary Carbon Market at COP30

France has taken climate leadership on several fronts. In April 2025 it launched the Coalition for Paris-aligned and high-integrity use of carbon credits, establishing quality as the fundamental criterion for effective carbon markets. In June 2025 it joined the Kenya-Singapore-UK Coalition to Grow Carbon Markets, and it champions bridging the three Rio Conventions on climate, biodiversity and desertification.

The stakes could not be higher. With atmospheric CO₂ above 420 ppm and developing countries needing at least $1.3 trillion a year for climate action by 2030, the decisions taken now on Article 6.4 of the Paris Agreement will determine whether carbon markets become inclusive mechanisms for global climate finance or remain limited in scope and participation. The voluntary carbon market has spent two decades learning to integrate carbon, biodiversity and social outcomes; that experience must inform the new frameworks, not be abandoned by them.

In brief: two priorities for France at COP30

1. Nature-based Solutions and engineered carbon removals should be promoted equally, through frameworks that match their maturity and scalability.
2. High-quality carbon projects must be defined not only by their climate integrity but also by their socio-economic and biodiversity co-benefits.

Two decades of integrity, ready to scale

The voluntary carbon market's two-decade journey has delivered the blueprint for scaling climate finance. Its hard-won experience produced today's integrity frameworks: the Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market (ICVCM) and its Core Carbon Principles as quality benchmarks, the Voluntary Carbon Markets Integrity Initiative (VCMI) and its guidelines for credible corporate claims, and the G20's commitment to transparency and interoperability. A once-niche market now stands ready to drive mainstream climate action.

Scaling demands one recognition: high-quality carbon credits inherently include environmental, social and economic co-benefits. Carbon without co-benefits is not high integrity.

Nature-based Solutions and engineered removals: both, not either

Both Nature-based Solutions (NbS) and engineered carbon removals must be supported through frameworks that match their maturity and scale potential.

• Nature-based Solutions are ready now: decades of proven methodologies, immediate deployment in threatened ecosystems, vital co-benefits for biodiversity and resilience, at costs that make them essential for low- and middle-income countries.
• Engineered removals are essential for the future: direct air capture (DACCS), bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) and mineralisation offer centuries-long storage for residual emissions, but face significant cost barriers and limited scale today.

The market must recognise this complementarity: Nature-based Solutions as the cornerstone of near-term action, engineered removals as critical long-term investments that need innovation and targeted support.

Priority 1: equal promotion of NbS and engineered removals

The IPCC indicates that limiting warming to 1.5°C will require 12 to 15 gigatonnes of carbon removals a year by mid-century, alongside deep emission reductions. That demands the immediate deployment of proven solutions while emerging technologies accelerate.

Nature-based Solutions play a crucial role in the near term. Their methodologies, developed and refined over more than two decades, come with robust safeguards for social integrity and biodiversity protection. They are the most effective channel for mobilising private finance to vulnerable communities, safeguarding ecosystems approaching irreversible tipping points and strengthening resilience to climate impacts already locked in.

Current estimates place Nature-based Solutions at US$10 to 50 per tonne of CO₂, against US$600 to 1,000 for direct air capture. For many countries in the Global South, this combination of affordability and development benefits makes NbS indispensable.

Engineered removals such as DACCS, BECCS and mineralisation, meanwhile, offer storage lasting centuries and will be essential to neutralise residual fossil emissions that cannot be abated. Today they remain expensive and limited in scale, contributing less than 0.1% of total carbon removals worldwide.

Rigid, one-size-fits-all definitions of permanence could unintentionally disadvantage Nature-based Solutions compared with engineered removals. Overly restrictive rules could reduce participation, limit market liquidity and increase costs, especially for actors in the Global South.

Priority 2: co-benefits as a condition of carbon integrity

Research shows that integrated approaches deliver superior outcomes. A systematic review in Frontiers in Environmental Science found that 88% of Nature-based Solutions interventions for climate adaptation also benefited ecosystem health, with an average 67% increase in species richness. These projects produce a triple benefit for climate, biodiversity and society.

Critically, these co-benefits flow mostly to the Global South, which holds the majority of the world's biodiversity hotspots, tropical forests and carbon-rich ecosystems, and where NbS projects are most viable and impactful. Brazil's Law 15.042/2024 builds on this foundation by mandating community benefits for carbon projects covering REDD+, forest conservation and sustainable forest management, and the Brazilian COP30 presidency stresses that adaptation is "no longer a choice, but a necessity". Nature-based Solutions deliver mitigation and adaptation at once.

France should therefore advocate that high-integrity carbon credits, by definition, deliver:

• environmental value beyond carbon: biodiversity protection, ecosystem health and climate resilience;
• community benefits: employment, capacity building and equitable benefit-sharing;
• sustainable development alignment: measurable contributions to the relevant SDGs.

Toward COP30: France's leadership opportunity

The voluntary carbon market has matured, integrity frameworks are in place, and COP30 in Brazil offers the platform to champion inclusive climate finance that builds on two decades of experience rather than fragmenting into competing markets. The path is clear:

• champion pragmatic permanence requirements that enable Nature-based Solutions to take part;
• ensure co-benefits are recognised as fundamental to carbon integrity, not optional extras;
• promote coalitions that develop a high-integrity carbon market across all regions;
• demonstrate leadership through French public and private investments aligned with these principles.

France's Charter has set the stage. The message for Brazil is unambiguous: carbon markets succeed when they recognise the full value of climate solutions, including their contributions to biodiversity, communities and sustainable development. France must ensure Article 6.4 delivers on this promise.

Read how the coalition carried these messages in Belém in our COP30 delegation report, and learn more about the Nature+ Coalition.