COP28: A Climate Watershed Moment

COP28 took place in Dubai from 30 November to 12 December 2023, and it raised the bar for climate credibility, especially for organisations making public claims that involve carbon credits. If you use credits, the biggest risk is rarely the purchase itself; it’s making a claim you can’t defend with clear boundaries and an evidence trail that stands up to scrutiny.

Key takeaways:

• COP28’s outcome (the “UAE Consensus”) included language on transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems.
• Integrity in carbon credits increasingly depends on recognised benchmarks for credit quality (Core Carbon Principles) and how claims are made (Claims Code of Practice).
• “Buying credits” is not the same as making a credible claim. Claims need clear governance, and documentation (Claims Code of Practice).
• The fastest way to reduce greenwashing risk is to standardise your data + evidence and maintain an audit trail from day one.
• Coral helps teams move from PDFs and spreadsheets to an audit-ready workflow for emissions and offset evidence.

COP28 in Dubai: why credibility became the headline

COP28 (Dubai, 30 Nov–12 Dec 2023) happened at a moment when climate impacts were intensifying and scrutiny on corporate climate communications was rising (UNFCCC COP28 overview). The outcome also delivered a clear signal: the “UAE Consensus” referenced transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems in a just, orderly, and equitable manner, alongside broader implementation-focused messages captured in the UNFCCC’s COP28 takeaways.

For organisations, the practical implication is simple: stakeholders increasingly expect proof and that includes any use of carbon credits in sustainability reporting or public-facing claims.

Carbon credits: the credibility gap is the proof

A carbon credit is commonly described as a unit representing one metric ton of CO₂e reduced or removed, issued to verified projects and used across voluntary and compliance contexts (carbon credits explainer). The concept is easy; the credibility chain is where teams get stuck:

• Quality: Is the unit high integrity?
• Governance: Who approved it, and under what rules?
• Claims: What are we saying publicly and what are we not saying?
• Evidence: Can we defend the claim with documentation that is complete and traceable?

Two widely used guardrails help teams move from “marketing language” to defensible practice:

• The Integrity Council’s Core Carbon Principles (CCPs) describe what “high-quality” credits should look like in the voluntary market.
• The Voluntary Carbon Markets Integrity Initiative’s Claims Code of Practice focuses on how organisations should communicate claims involving carbon credits credibly.

A practical checklist for defensible carbon credit use

Use this checklist before credits appear in a sustainability report, press release, product claim, or website copy.

1) Credit quality: what did we buy?

• Capture the standard/program, project type, vintage, and unit identifiers (serials / registry references) See our blog on: carbon credits.
• Document the quality attributes you rely on (e.g., quantification method, verification, permanence risk management) and ensure your internal approval process can explain why this credit meets your bar (Source: Core Carbon Principles).

2) Ownership + retirement: what can we legitimately say?

• Keep purchase records (contract/invoice), plus registry exports or screenshots that link units to your organisation (or your authorised agent).
• Confirm whether credits were retired (and by whom), and retain retirement proof and identifiers (serial/retirement IDs) so the claim is traceable and repeatable. See our blog on carbon credits.

3) Claims: what exactly are we communicating?

• Write your claim in one sentence, then test it: Does it imply we reduced our own emissions, or that we financed reductions/removals outside our value chain?
• Align wording to a recognised claims framework so your public language is clear and doesn’t overstate what credits mean (Source: Claims Code of Practice).

4) Reporting: can we reproduce this next year?

• Disclose the year, organisational boundary, and where credits are applied (corporate-wide vs. product line vs. event).
• Maintain a simple ledger: purchased → held → retired → reported. The goal is “auditable story,” not “one-off narrative.”

Where Coral fits

Offset and claims documentation often lives across procurement systems, inboxes, spreadsheets, and PDFs. Coral helps teams consolidate activity and evidence, standardise it into consistent datasets, and maintain a defensible audit trail so sustainability reporting becomes repeatable, decision-grade, and audit-ready (Emissions Management System, ESG reporting).

If you want to see how teams structure a “claims + evidence” workflow end-to-end, you can book a demo and we’ll walk you right through it.

FAQ

What dates did COP28 take place in Dubai?

COP28 ran from 30 November to 12 December 2023 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (Source UNFCCC COP28 overview).

What are the Core Carbon Principles (CCPs)?

The Core Carbon Principles are a set of principles designed to help identify high-quality carbon credits and raise integrity in the voluntary carbon market.

What does the Claims Code of Practice help companies do?

The Claims Code of Practice provides guidance on making credible claims involving carbon credits, emphasising transparency, integrity, and clear communication of what credits do (and don’t) represent.

What evidence should we keep to defend a carbon-credit claim?

At minimum: purchase records, registry serials, retirement proof, project verification documentation, a clear boundary statement for the claim, and the exact report/communication where the claim appears. See our blog on carbon credits.

Do carbon credits replace internal emissions reductions?

No, most credible approaches treat credits as complementary: useful for financing mitigation/removals, but not a substitute for reducing your own emissions and improving operational performance (Source: Claims Code of Practice).

Next step: If your reporting still happens across spreadsheets and PDFs at month-end, Coral can help you make the evidence trail audit-ready and repeatable, book a demo with us!