THE NEW CARBON ORDER: IETA LAUNCHES LATEST GREENHOUSE GAS REPORT

IETA’s annual Greenhouse Gas Report is launching at a moment of truth. The question is no longer if markets are needed, but how rapidly we can connect, scale, and integrate the existing patchwork of voluntary and compliance systems into a cohesive, borderless architecture. This is a vital task to ensure capital flows instantly to low-cost abatement opportunities worldwide, while driving innovation across every sector.

Dirk Forrister, IETA President & CEO, said: “The global order is being reset by power demand, trade wars, and the climate emergency. The New Carbon Order is our necessary response. It is not a single, monolithic market. It is a System of Systems – a dynamic, integrated ecosystem built for the scale of this new challenge. This architecture must enable low-carbon trade and investment to become the default setting for global commerce.” 

This 'System of Systems' is built on core pillars driving future trends and growth opportunities:

• Competitiveness: Incentives and price signals must be powerful and clear enough to steer the trillions of dollars needed for the climate and transition, ensuring that investment in low-carbon growth is consistently more competitive – appropriate accounting frameworks must encourage and grow global markets.
• Cooperation: Mechanisms like Article 6 of the Paris Agreement are non-negotiable. They are the essential diplomatic and legal links that allow companies and countries to cooperate on emission reductions, driving cross-border abatement projects and preventing a fractured, protectionist world of isolated and inefficient carbon bubbles.
• Innovation: Technology is an indispensable catalyst. The Report details how AI-driven verification, digital MRV and blockchain registries are creating a digital backbone that ensures unprecedented transparency, integrity, and operational speed – redefining how capital is deployed in forests, industry, and energy.
• Governments must set the clear, ambitious frameworks and caps.
• Businesses must deploy the capital, creativity, and execution at speed.
• The Global Community must demand credible, fair and equitable outcomes.

“Technology alone is insufficient. The New Carbon Order demands governance that matches the moment’s ambition,” Forrister continued. “This means uncompromising integrity, compatible global data standards, and clear rules and frameworks that enable credits and allowances to be created and traded with complete confidence.”

The ultimate success of this infrastructure depends on radical collaboration – the meeting point of policy leadership and private-sector innovation. 

“The era of carbon market ‘experiment’ is over,” concluded Forrister. “It has become the essential infrastructure for future prosperity. The New Carbon Order will be built by those who embrace collaboration and the power of markets to drive a low-carbon, high-growth future.”

IETA’s 2025 Greenhouse Gas Report, The New Carbon Order, brings together some of the world’s leading carbon-market voices, offering authoritative insights across compliance and voluntary markets, government systems, legal frameworks, and the fast-evolving digital frontier. With guest authors from across industry, finance, law, policy, and technology, the report captures both the breadth and depth of expertise shaping this rapidly evolving landscape.

Read The Carbon Order, IETA's 2025 Greenhouse Gas Report here.