Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA)
As of 31 December 2019, 81 States, representing 76.73% of international aviation activity, announced their intentions to voluntarily participate in CORSIA from 2021.
Following the adoption by the Council in June 2018 of the First Edition of Annex 16 –
Environmental Protection, Volume IV –
Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA), which contains Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs) for the implementation of CORSIA, it became effective on 22 October 2018, and applicable on 1 January 2019.
In addition to CORSIA-related recommendations from the CAEP/11 meeting, the development of the CORSIA Central Registry (CCR) was initiated by the selected supplier. The CCR was delivered by the end of the year for operationalization from early 2020. In the absence of the CCR, ICAO had developed an online spreadsheet to assist reporting by States in 2018 and 2019. By December 2019, 122 States had used this online spreadsheet to submit information on the 690 Aeroplane Operators attributed to them. Also by December 2019, 10 States had reported information on 26 Verification Bodies accredited by them. In addition, the Council approved the 2019 version of the ICAO CO2 Estimation and Reporting Tool (CERT) to help with the monitoring and reporting of international aviation CO2 emissions by aeroplane operators under the CORSIA.
The ICAO Council established the Technical Advisory Body (TAB) with the objective of making recommendations to the Council on eligible emissions units for use under CORSIA. The Council agreed on a list of 19 TAB members, and approved the Terms of Reference (TOR) for the TAB. The Council also approved the Emissions Unit Criteria (EUC) to be used by the TAB in undertaking its tasks to assess emissions units programmes against the EUC. Three face-to-face meetings of TAB were held in 2019, along with a number of teleconferences to advance the assessment work of TAB.
ICAO organized regional workshops on CORSIA from March to April 2019 in five venues, as follows:
- Asunción, Paraguay for NACC and SAM regions;
- Helsinki, Finland for EUR‐NAT region;
- Seoul, Republic of Korea for APAC region;
- Cairo, Egypt for MID region; and
- Dakar, Senegal for ESAF and WACAF regions.
Particular focus of the
regional workshops was on any pending issues regarding the monitoring of CO2 emissions in 2019, including the approval of Emissions Monitoring Plans by States, as well as on reporting and verification of CO2 emissions from international aviation to support States in complying with the related provisions of the CORSIA SARPs by early 2020.
