Understanding risk in transport carbon projects: Headwinds and tailwinds

Here are some key takeaways

• Transport carbon projects span a diverse range of activities — from electric two-wheelers in sub-Saharan Africa to reduced engine-idling solutions in the USA — each with distinct risk profiles.

• Permanence is a sector strength: avoided-emissions credits face very low reversal risk, in contrast to much of the nature-based solutions market.

• Additionality and carbon accounting are where quality diverges, driven by the financial attractiveness of many transport activities without carbon finance and the difficulty of evidencing counterfactual behaviour at scale.

• Design choices made early in project development, particularly around monitoring infrastructure and additionality documentation, have an outsized effect on long-term quality outcomes.

• BeZero Carbon has rated transport projects across multiple sub-types and has worked with governments assessing Article 6.2 credits in the transport sector.