Econetix delivers first Phase 1 CORSIA credits under million-dollar offtake
Carbon asset manager Econetix announced on 17 July that it has completed its first delivery of Phase 1-tagged CORSIA-eligible carbon credits to a major international commodity trading house, fulfilling a seven-figure offtake agreement signed earlier this year and underlining the scarcity of qualifying supply in the aviation compliance market.
The delivery makes the Vienna-based company one of a small group of developers globally that have converted an authorised project portfolio into contracted and delivered supply under CORSIA, the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation overseen by the International Civil Aviation Organization. Under the scheme, airlines must offset the growth in international aviation emissions above 85% of 2019 levels, and credits used for Phase 1 compliance, covering 2024 to 2026, must be cancelled by January 2028.
CORSIA-eligible units are in structurally short supply because they require host-country authorisation and corresponding adjustments under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, ensuring reductions are not counted twice. Industry body IATA has estimated airlines will need between 146 million and 236 million eligible emissions units for Phase 1 alone, while analyst projections point to demand of as much as 1.6 billion credits through 2035. Airlines are currently issuing requests for proposals and trading houses are building positions ahead of the compliance deadline, sharpening the mismatch between demand and the limited pool of authorised credits.
This is Econetix’s third significant CORSIA transaction in 2026, following an inaugural supply agreement with SCB Environmental Markets announced in February, involving credits from a Gold Standard-registered clean cooking and solar lighting project in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and a multi-million-dollar forward supply agreement in May with SmartestEnergy, the Marubeni Group subsidiary, for distribution to aviation and corporate buyers. The company is progressing more than ten projects across the Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda, Tanzania, Malawi and Sierra Leone through Article 6 authorisation and CORSIA certification pathways.
The delivery also comes at a moment of regulatory flux for the aviation credit market. The European Commission has recently signalled it will not impose stricter quality criteria on Phase 1 CORSIA credits used in connection with the EU’s framework, while maintaining tougher standards for Phase 2 from 2027, and its broader assessment of CORSIA’s interaction with the EU ETS is expected to influence the premium commanded by high-integrity, fully authorised supply. What is new in this announcement relative to Econetix’s earlier deals is the completion of physical delivery of Phase 1-tagged units, moving the company’s CORSIA business from contracted pipeline to executed supply.
