The Nickel Report

Last week marked the close of the 30th Conference of the Parties (COP30) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Belém, Brazil. COP30, billed by some as the COP of “truth” or “implementation,” sought to advance key issues tied to the climate goals established under the Paris Agreement, now ten years in effect. Below is an overview of the most notable developments from Belém and the emerging expectations for future climate action.

A much reported takeaway from COP30 is the fact that it concluded without agreement on a unified roadmap to phase down fossil fuel use. More than 80 countries reportedly pushed for a detailed global plan. But consensus proved elusive, underscoring persistent geopolitical and economic divisions, and the term “fossil fuels” does not appear in the final COP30 decision text—the Global Mutirão (a Brazilian term derived from the indigenous Tupi-Guarani language meaning “collective effort”). Instead, the outcome defers the issue to voluntary national and regional processes and a Brazil‑led initiative outside the formal UNFCCC track focused on developing transition strategies.

Attention also focused on the absence of US federal officials, marking the first COP in 30 years without formal US government representation. This absence reflects the Trump Administration’s climate and energy policy positions and its narrower approach to multilateral climate engagement. In contrast, California Governor Gavin Newsom attended COP30, sharply criticizing federal climate policy and positioning California—the world’s fourth‑largest economy—as a “stable and reliable partner” for global climate mitigation efforts.

At the same time, many observers viewed COP30 as an important step in sustaining international climate cooperation amid significant geopolitical and market headwinds. COP30 involved consultations on several key topics, led by pairs of developed and developing countries, including adaptation, finance, mitigation, just transition, technology, and gender. The Global Mutirão decision document emphasizes progress made over the past decade, including rapid technological advancements, falling clean‑energy costs, and record investment in renewable power and low‑carbon infrastructure. It also expressly reaffirms the commitment made in the Paris Agreement to pursue efforts to limit the global average temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels and “acknowledges that the global transition towards low greenhouse gas emissions and climate‑resilient development is irreversible and the trend of the future,” signaling the continued long‑term direction of global climate policy.

Below are additional high level takeaways from COP30:

• Nationally Determined Contributions- In the lead-up to COP30, many stakeholders called for greater climate ambition—including updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), which outline each nation’s emissions-reduction targets and broader climate-action commitments. NDC revisions can translate into new permitting requirements, technology standards, procurement rules, and climate‑related disclosure obligations. A significant number of countries have yet to submit their updated NDCs, and there was broad consensus in Belém that the current set of NDCs is insufficient to keep global temperature rise below 1.5°C. Under the Paris Agreement, the next NDC cycle will cover 2025–2035, with progress assessed during the next Global Stocktake.

The final COP30 decision underscored the need to align existing NDCs with nations’ long-term strategies for low-emissions development and encouraged nations to chart pathways toward global net-zero emissions by mid-century, keeping the 1.5°C goal “within reach.” Post-COP30, attention will shift to both raising ambition (e.g., stronger mitigation targets in forthcoming NDCs) and moving from ambition to implementation, including country-specific and sector-specific plans—particularly in energy, industry, transport, and land use. These forthcoming strategies will shape regulatory frameworks, investment signals, and compliance obligations for private-sector actors across multiple jurisdictions.

• Forest Preservation- Although the Global Mutirão omitted any formal plan to address deforestation, despite fairly widespread support among countries, one of the most consequential outcomes of COP30 was the announcement of the Tropical Forests Forever Facility (TFFF)—a proposed $125 billion, performance-based fund aimed at compensating tropical nations for preserving standing forests. Potential performance metrics expected under TFFF include verified reductions in annual deforestation, forest carbon stock maintenance, and satellite validated land use change avoidance. Although questions remain about how TFFF will be capitalized and governed, its launch marks a major pivot toward scalable, results-based finance for nature, with an emphasis on high-value forest regions in the Amazon, Congo Basin, and Southeast Asia.

TFFF’s design signals a shift away from short-term, project-level conservation toward predictable, multi-decade, sovereign-level forest-protection finance supported by robust, science-driven monitoring. Importantly for private-sector stakeholders, payments will be tied to verified reductions in deforestation, opening clearer commercial pathways for carbon-market integration, jurisdictional nature-based credits, and blended-finance structures. TFFF is also expected to operate alongside emerging regulatory regimes—such as the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR)—and may help create a more coherent policy environment for corporate supply-chain compliance and sustainability reporting. Together, these developments position TFFF as a potentially transformative tool for companies navigating evolving legal, financial, and ESG expectations around forest risk.

• Carbon Capture Utilization and Storage- Although the Global Mutirão does not explicitly reference “carbon capture, utilization, and storage” (CCUS), several provisions in the COP30 Global Climate Action Agenda Outcomes Report (Action Agenda) directly implicate CCUS deployment and national abatement strategies. The Action Agenda acknowledges the role of industrial abatement technologies where they are technologically and economically feasible—an important signal for private-sector stakeholders. In practice, CCUS remains the only scalable abatement pathway capable of enabling continued operation of certain carbon-intensive assets, particularly in hard-to-decarbonize sectors. The Action Agenda urges nations to accelerate emissions reductions in heavy industry, emphasizing net-zero-aligned technology pathways for iron and steel, cement, chemicals, refining, and other major sources of CO₂. For project developers, investors, and industrial operators, this language provides a clearer policy basis for CCUS integration—supporting investment certainty, informing permitting strategies, and shaping long-term decarbonization planning.

Notably, the London Register of Subsurface CO₂ Storage, a consortium of scientists and industrial partners led by the Imperial College London, published its first annual report on global CO₂ storage during COP30. The report finds that over 383 million tons of CO₂ have been sequestered since 1996—the equivalent of 81 million vehicles driven for a year. The report’s authors claim that the report illustrates that CCUS is an essential tool—a proven, scalable technology needed to tackle climate change. As countries revise their NDCs and develop associated implementation plans, CCUS is poised to become a more prominent component of national strategies.

• Transparency- Measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV) emerged as a central theme at COP30, reflecting the growing emphasis on implementation, transparency, and accountability across all pillars of the Paris Agreement. The final agreement reaffirmed obligations under the Enhanced Transparency Framework (ETF) and underscored that high-quality MRV systems are essential for tracking progress toward NDCs – emissions and removals – and supporting the next Global Stocktake. Regarding carbon markets, COP30 focused on operationalizing MRV rules under Article 6, with renewed attention to ensuring environmental integrity, preventing double counting, and standardizing reporting formats for internationally transferred mitigation outcomes (ITMOs) under Article 6.2. Practically, this call for further progress on MRV must be balanced with nation-specific developments to pull back from existing MRV frameworks.
• Adaptation- A major headline from COP30 was the political commitment to “at least triple” global adaptation finance with a target of $120 billion by 2035, signaling an intent to substantially scale resources for climate-resilient infrastructure, water systems, and agriculture. Like with TFFF noted above, this pledge is not yet accompanied by financial commitments, reflecting remaining uncertainty associated with climate finance. This commitment nonetheless reflects growing international recognition that adaptation funding must increase. For private-sector stakeholders, increased funding is expected to drive demand for resilient energy systems, grid and transmission upgrades, long-duration storage, cooling technologies, flood- and heat-resistant infrastructure, and sophisticated monitoring, data, and risk-management services. It would also support the growth of public-private partnerships, blended-finance structures, and resilience-focused investment platforms.
• Article 6 Carbon Markets- The final COP30 agreement reiterates countries’ obligations under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, which governs international carbon markets. Article 6.2 enables countries to trade internationally transferred mitigation outcomes (ITMOs) towards their NDCs, while Article 6.4 establishes a centralized crediting mechanism allowing both public and private entities to generate and trade carbon credits—often referred to as the Paris Agreement Crediting Mechanism. Although the Article 6 “rulebook” was largely completed at COP29 in Baku, COP30 shifted attention from negotiation to implementation. Discussions emphasized the practical steps needed to operationalize these markets, including safeguards for environmental integrity, measures to prevent low-quality credits, and alignment of Article 6 transactions with countries’ NDCs.

A consistent message from negotiators and observers was the need for accelerated deployment of Article 6 frameworks to unlock investment and support carbon markets. Looking ahead, the post-COP30 work will need to address several outstanding issues. These include rules on permanence and reversal risk, procedures for transitioning legacy Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) credits into the Article 6.4 system, and the development of nature-based methodologies, particularly for forestry and other land-sector activities. These decisions will shape market confidence, credit eligibility, and investment strategies in the emerging Article 6 landscape.

• Trade- The Global Mutirão acknowledged the importance of international trade policies to climate action. Although the COP30 agenda did not formally include trade measures discussion, as some parties reportedly advocated for, the final agreement nonetheless reaffirmed that climate action measures “should not constitute a means of arbitrary or unjustifiable discrimination or a disguised restriction on international trade.” It also established a series of dialogs to occur over the next three years years among the Parties and other key stakeholders, including the World Trade Organization, to “consider opportunities, challenges and barriers in relation to enhancing international cooperation related to the role of trade.”

COP moves to Antalya, Turkey in 2026, with plenty remaining on the agenda, in particular updating NDCs and the creation of country-specific implementation plans, further engagement on the role of fossil fuels, and operationalizing the Article 6 framework to maximize the potential of carbon markets. These conversations will occur against the backdrop of challenging issues like a historic increase in base load power demand and emerging global trade barriers, among other geopolitical and economic developments. 2026 promises to be an eventful year in the advancement of the issues central to global climate change and the energy transition.