How modeling scenarios informed the emergence of a global carbon market coalition at COP30
The Open Coalition on Compliance Carbon Markets, announced by leaders from 10 countries and the European Union, draws from a proposal from the Global Climate Policy Project at Harvard and MIT.
Cambridge, Mass., Nov. 08, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- A new initiative announced at the Leaders’ Summit of COP30 in Belém, Brazil, was informed by a report released in September 2025 by the Global Climate Policy Project at Harvard and MIT (GCPP), which is dedicated to identifying and advancing innovations in global climate policies and institutions.
Signatories from Brazil, China, the European Union, United Kingdom, Canada, Chile, Germany, Mexico, Armenia, Zambia, and France, representing about 40% of global emissions, at COP30 intend to work “expeditiously” to establish the Open Coalition on Compliance Carbon Markets — a forum for discussing experiences and sharing lessons on carbon pricing, carbon accounting, offsets, and verification systems — to accelerate multilateral coordination on carbon pricing and trade.
“The Open Coalition will focus on climate action and enable progress by providing a framework in which members would advance possibilities of coordination on development and enhancement of compliance carbon markets,” the declaration read. The coalition “will explore options to promote interoperability of compliance carbon markets in the long term.”
“Global leaders took an important first step to advance carbon pricing, avert trade frictions, and unlock billions in new funding,” said Catherine Wolfram, the William Barton Rogers Professor of Energy Economics and Professor of Applied Economics at the MIT Sloan School of Management, faculty co-lead of the Global Climate Policy Project and affiliated faculty member at the MIT Climate Policy Center.
“Our research shows that a well-designed carbon-pricing coalition can drive large-scale climate action and prevent a chaotic patchwork of border levies,” Wolfram said. “We’re excited to see leaders send such a clear political signal that countries are serious about aligning compliance carbon markets.”
The GCPP at Harvard and MIT is based at the Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability at Harvard University and the MIT Climate Policy Center. GCPP also receives support from the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard University. The GCPP’s September report, a working paper titled “Building a Climate Coalition: Aligning Carbon Pricing, Trade, and Development,” was developed with input from a working group of thought leaders and academics from many of the world’s major emitting nations.
Through modeling scenarios, it outlined a practical pathway to decarbonize heavy industry, independent of the pace of global consensus within the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, while keeping developing-economy priorities at the forefront.
Wolfram served on an ad hoc council of economists advising COP30 leaders and presented the coalition concept in June at an official event hosted by the Government of Brazil. COP30 host Brazil placed the report’s proposal on its COP30 agenda and convened allied countries for technical sessions in the lead-up to the summit.
“Catherine Wolfram’s work through the Global Climate Policy Project at Harvard and MIT paid major dividends for global leaders focused on climate adaptation and mitigation,” said Bethany Patten, executive director of the MIT Climate Policy Center. “As MIT’s ‘front door’ for local, state, federal, and international climate policymakers, our mission is to serve as a trusted, nonpartisan resource for evidence-based climate policy. This is a great example of our model in action.”
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Casey Bayer MIT Sloan School of Management 914.584.9095 bayerc@mit.edu
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