AsianOil: CPC receives Taiwan’s first cargo of carbon-offset crude

Taiwan’s CPC announced on June 12 that it had received the country’s first cargo of certified carbon-offset crude. The cargo totalled 1.05mn barrels of oil and was delivered by the trading arm of Azerbaijan’s state-owned SOCAR.
The cargo’s cradle-to-gate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions had been offset with carbon credits certified by the Verified Carbon Standard (VCS). All credits had been issued less than six years ago, with the majority derived from nature-based projects that have additional Climate, Community and Biodiversity (CCB) accreditation, CPC stated.
The company said the emissions associated with the cargo had been calculated with support from Deloitte and Siglar Carbon, with the calculations then verified by Intertek Group. The entire trade was independently certified as carbon neutral by Intertek and Climate Neutral Commodity, an independent commodity certification specialist, CPC added.
The trade comes after SOCAR and CPC signed a framework agreement on the facilitation of carbon offset operations for emissions related to crude deliveries.
CPC has also started receiving carbon-neutral cargoes of LNG in recent years, with the emissions from those cargoes also offset using nature-based carbon credits. Last year, the company also signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) on co-operation over the supply of carbon-neutral LNG.
These moves to receive and distribute more carbon-neutral oil and gas come as Taiwan targets net-zero GHG emissions by 2050.