Net Zero Festival: Negative emissions - can carbon offsets ever be credible?

Negative emissions technologies and nature-based solutions are likely to play a vital role in delivering net zero emissions, and certainly in stabilising the climate be reducing emissions in the atmosphere in the second half of the century.

However, the global offsets market remains dogged by legitimate concerns about its efficacy, and companies run the risk of 'greenwashing' accusations from campaigners and consumers. So what, if anything, can be done to ensure carbon offsets projects are credible and deliver on their promised emissions reductions?

A host of leading experts from across the spectrum of industry, academia, green NGOs and the offsets market itself came together to discuss this question at BusinessGreen's recent Net Zero Festival including: Alastair Mant, director of business transformation at the UK Green Building Council (UKBC); Ariel Perez managing partner at Vertree; Friends of the Earth's head of science, policy and research Mike Childs; and Professor Nathalie Seddon, director of the Nature-based Solutions Initiative at the University of Oxford.