EDF Hails Island Nations' Plan to Join Global Carbon Market
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Copenhagen (Dec 18)—Environmental Defense Fund today hailed the move by Small Island Developing States (SIDS) to cap greenhouse gas emissions and “dock” into financing opportunities in the global carbon market.
Led by Grenada, a group of island states signed a groundbreaking agreement Friday to work together to increase energy efficiency, lower fossil fuel consumption and adopt hard targets for lowering tons of greenhouse gas emissions from a baseline year.
“This is a dramatic move from rhetoric to action,” said Peter Goldmark, Director of EDF’s Climate & Air Program. “SIDS Dock is an investment vehicle that can finance the islands’ transition from high-cost, high-carbon, largely imported fuels to a clean and more affordable economy.”
“By choosing a course that will quickly lead to hard targets on CO2 reductions, they will be able to take advantage of preferential terms for carbon market access like those contained in the U.S. House-passed Waxman-Markey bill,” said Goldmark.
Grenada’s Prime Minister Tillman Thomas, the Chair of the broader Alliance of Small Island Nations (AOSIS), announced the initiative in Copenhagen. He said clean energy growth will be essential for islands’ sustainable development, adding that these small states need secure financing and cost-effective solutions to make the shift to clean energy.
The initiative, called SIDS-Dock, is an institutional mechanism that would allow island states to plug into carbon markets and generate financing when they take a hard emissions cap. Those funds can then be used to invest in capacity building and logistical resources to transform islands’ energy sectors.
“Small islands have to act boldly because for them climate change is already a matter of life and death,” said Goldmark. “Let’s hope the rest of us take a lesson and move ahead courageously.”
Peter Goldmark / 1-202-316-4914 / pgoldmark@edf.org
Andrea Welsh / 1-202-297-7723 / awelsh@edf.org
With more than 3 million members, Environmental Defense Fund creates transformational solutions to the most serious environmental problems. To do so, EDF links science, economics, law, and innovative private-sector partnerships to turn solutions into action. edf.org
Latest press releases
-
EDF Statement on the Fifth Anniversary of the Virginia Clean Economy Act
July 1, 2025 -
Latest Senate Bill Only Harms Clean Energy When More is Needed
June 28, 2025 -
Energy Commission Provides a Balanced Roadmap to Stabilize California Gasoline Markets
June 27, 2025 -
New Debt Financing Structure Published to Scale Oil and Gas Methane Emissions Reductions
June 24, 2025 -
The Biggest Conservation Success Story You’ve Never Heard Of!
June 24, 2025 -
Supreme Court Ruling Does Not Address Merits of California Vehicle Standards, Does Determine that Fuel Industry Has Standing to Challenge Them
June 20, 2025