Green finance and technology solutions for net-zero emissions

However, the success of these measures comes down to their economic and financial effects on the local businesses. I’m currently leading a research project whose preliminary results indicate that polluting sectors tend to be punished after Vietnam’s Paris Climate Agreement ratification. These results are consistent with those of developed countries in our other research studies, including Singapore and France.

We found that private and foreign-invested enterprises in Vietnam that use polluting energy sources such as coal are not yet punished by law and their profitability even increases if they use non-environmentally friendly energy sources. Therefore, a more stringent approach is required by the government if it wants to achieve the set environmental goals.

In addition to the regulatory effort, the government is also actively participating in the green bond market whereby Vietnam is ranked second in the Southeast Asian region for green bond issuance. Over 80 per cent of these bonds are government bonds, according to the ASEAN Sustainable Finance – State of the Market 2021 report released by the Climate Bonds Initiative and HSBC.

It is good to see the exponential growth of the green bond market in Vietnam and the proceeds from these bonds allocated to eligible green projects. However, we need to have a mechanism to monitor and quantify the effectiveness of these projects in terms of reducing carbon emissions or in other words, the success of the projects funded by green bonds.

The government is also planning to pilot emission allowances and an emission trading scheme from 2025 but this timeline might not be sufficient to help Vietnam achieve its 2030 emission reduction target. To achieve these goals, Vietnam requires effort from not only the government but also other stakeholders such as the private sector. Many companies aim to achieve net-zero emissions but most do not have a concrete plan to make it happen.

Currently, the most common approach is through the carbon offset market and the companies can purchase carbon offsets to achieve their reduction goals. However, this approach should be criticised whereby the rich (companies or nations) can easily offset their emissions while the long-term impact on the environment is not guaranteed as the projects which are funded by the money spent on these carbon offsets might not be effective at all.

Therefore, it requires a mechanism to ensure that businesses not only purchase carbon offsets but also have to make an actual effort to reduce their CO2 emissions. In addition, both the public and private sectors in Vietnam need to pay more attention to other methods of capturing or reducing CO2 emissions, in terms of both regulation and investment. For instance, liquid and solid direct air capture technologies (DAC) are considered the most effective way to reduce such emissions. Other methods should also be considered such as geologic and biologic carbon sequestration.

Another aspect that also requires attention is the ability to track, record, and monitor emissions data as it plays a crucial role in helping Vietnam achieve its net-zero emissions target.

Tokenisation, for instance, has been considered an effective approach. A CO2 token (representing one tonne of CO2 either captured, stored, or measured) can be minted and available for purchase once verified by a validating party. The token can also be burned if the token holders opt to use it to offset their carbon footprint. This tokenisation approach could improve the carbon accounting process, enhance the liquidity of emissions, and allow different emission trading schemes/markets to link to each other with ease.

In addition, blockchain is expected to improve environmental, social, and governance reporting whereby the reporting suffers from non-transparent, questionable and hard-to-trace data at the firm level. At country and regional levels, one critical problem with emission trading schemes is they are susceptible to fraudulent activities, such as carbon-trading frauds. Blockchain could be a valuable tool to increase reporting transparency and increase emission traceability.

With the application of blockchain, businesses are also less likely to commit carbon emissions fraud because governments can easily track emissions at the firm level in real time. Finally, blockchain will also help stakeholders transform individual efforts into a network effort that could further boost innovations for fighting the impacts of climate change.

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