Towards a Distributed Carbon Ledger for the Integration of Carbon Asset Management and Emissions Trading

GHG emissions control requires coordinated efforts and collaboration at all levels of governmental bodies, non-for-profit organisations and private sectors. However, the target is difficult to achieve due to challenges arising from conflicts of interest and lack of trust between stakeholders. Thus, we propose a distributed carbon ledger (DCL) system using blockchain technology. Our analysis suggests that the adoption of DCL not only strengthens the corporate accounting system for carbon asset management but also fits within existing market-based emissions trading schemes (ETSs). Blockchain-enabled DCL allows the integration of national ETSs and corporate carbon asset management into a synthetic single mechanism.