UK carbon and nature markets event: what we heard, what comes next

The UK’s climate leadership ambitions come at a critical juncture. As global sentiment around carbon markets swings between hope and scrutiny, there’s a renewed sense of urgency, and opportunity, to get it right.  

It was against this backdrop that BeZero co-hosted the UK Carbon and Nature Markets event with Lloyds.

The event took place in the middle of the UK Government’s period of consultation on implementing their high-level principles for voluntary carbon and nature markets. It brought together the leading voices shaping the future of carbon markets in the UK: market infrastructure, investors, project developers, corporate buyers and policymakers were all represented.

Through the afternoon, four key themes shone through above the others.

1. Learn from supply-side progress. Apply it to demand 

There was unanimous agreement: supply-side mechanisms are maturing, but the real bottleneck is demand. 

So how do we incentivise action from buyers? 

• Credible projects with certainty of delivery: Corporate buyer panellists illustrated their rationale. Carbon removals are essential to their net zero plan, but the economics need to stack up. High-integrity credits must come with a clearer use case and reduced reputational risk. 
• Make the process straightforward: Complex deals and documentation, along with questions over when the buyer pays adds to the challenges for corporates. Standardisation and forward-financing will help to mitigate this.

Offtakes are the enabler, demand-side policy, therefore, is the missing link and credits should be treated like infrastructure assets, with the same long-term certainty and financial instruments we apply to other markets. 

Emily Martin, Head of Voluntary Carbon and Nature Markets, Lloyds Corporate & Institutional, drove home the commercial reality:

"We’ve got plenty of projects waiting to be financed. But we need offtakes in place - we need the buyers."

And the challenge isn’t a lack of capital. 

"There are plenty of banks like us waiting on the sidelines, ready to deploy money,” Emily added, “but the developers don’t have a way of repaying that debt without long-term demand certainty.” 

This aligns closely with the vision laid out in BeZero’s latest report, From Risk to Reward: Making the UK the Carbon Markets Capital of the World, which highlights the need to unlock demand through policy, ratings, and financial infrastructure.

2. The role of government: reducing policy risk, building confidence

The Department for Energy Security & Net Zero’s Zoe Norgate emphasised that the UK government’s current consultation on voluntary carbon and nature markets, which seeks to clarify and test the UK Government’s proposed policy and governance framework for ensuring the integrity of carbon credits, is a genuine request for feedback, not a done deal. The goal is to clarify market rules and reduce policy risk, which is currently a major barrier to investment.

The panel discussed how  government guarantees could de-risk the market just as they did in wind energy, exactly the kind of demand-side certainty that, as noted earlier, enabled infrastructure-scale financing in other sectors:

The consultation aims to address these gaps by offering clearer guidance on claims, accounting treatment, and potentially codifying high-integrity standards (like carbon ratings and CCPs) into official frameworks.

That feedback must focus on demand-side confidence, including:

• Clear, consistent guidance on claims and disclosures
• Integration of ratings and standards into reporting frameworks
• Public signals that de-risk participation for buyers and financiers
• Mechanisms to provide revenue certainty, such as offtake guarantees

This echoes one of BeZero’s report’s recommendations for the UK government to back a robust claims framework for corporate buyers. 

3. Making carbon a CFO issue

How do you get CFOs to care? Make carbon strategy visible on the balance sheet. 

One of the biggest opportunities is reframing voluntary carbon as a financial issue. Businesses won’t scale action until carbon is understood as an investable line item.

Gaby Carden, Head of Voluntary Carbon and Nature Markets, Lloyds Corporate Markets, summed it up clearly:

"Fundamentally, buyers want three things: clear net zero standards, policy support, and a business rationale - both financial and reputational."

Transition plans are one route forward. The panellists agreed that offsetting strategies will only become mainstream if they’re embedded in broader business planning, not seen as an optional add-on.

4. The integrity imperative

Integrity was the word that echoed across every conversation. Without high integrity, trust erodes. And without trust, the market stalls. This is where transparency tools and support for standards are becoming foundational.

BeZero’s contribution to this is clear: project-level ratings that help buyers understand quality and risk.

This isn’t about driving prices up, it's about rewarding quality. Especially in a market still navigating volatility, buyers are prioritising assurance over speculation.

Calls to action

BeZero’s Chief Innovation Officer & Co-founder Sebastien Cross summed up these themes into five calls to action: 

1. Respond to the UK consultation by July 10 – and push for demand-side support and guidance.
2. Educate finance and procurement teams – make carbon a strategic, not symbolic, conversation.
3. Champion ratings and transparency tools – integrity is the foundation of trust.
4. Invest in offtakes – offtakes create the certainty developers and financiers need.
5. Be pragmatic, not purist – better to act now with integrity than wait for perfection.

Conclusion: The UK’s opportunity to lead

As BeZero’s CEO & Co-founder, Tommy Ricketts, closed:

"This isn’t just about trading carbon - it’s about building infrastructure, institutions, and incentives that can be exported globally."

The UK can lead the world in carbon markets - if it seizes the moment: £1bn in tax, 135,000 jobs created and £10bn a year in private capital. 

The blueprint is there. The real question is whether we choose to act on it.

Let’s get moving.

Download BeZero’s latest report, “From risk to reward: Making the UK the carbon markets capital of the world”, here