Weyerhaeuser Company announced an agreement for the sale of nearly 32,000 forest carbon credits at $29 per credit. This agreement marks Weyerhaeuser's first transaction in the voluntary carbon market and represents the sale of all credits issued by ACR for the first year of the company's Kibby Skinner Improved Forest Management (IFM) Project in Maine. Weyerhaeuser will immediately retire these credits on behalf of the buyer.
"We are pleased to be delivering our first forest carbon credits from our Maine project," says Russell Hagen, senior vice president and chief development officer for Weyerhaeuser. "This initial sale is an important milestone for Weyerhaeuser and demonstrates our commitment to offering only the highest-quality credits to the market."
Weyerhaeuser is currently developing several IFM projects on select areas within its 11-million-acre land base in the U.S., including two in the U.S. South anticipated to be approved in 2024. The company is working with Carbon Direct to deliver scientifically robust, high-quality forest carbon credits. Carbon Direct is providing advisory and marketing services and helping ensure Weyerhaeuser projects meet the Criteria for High-Quality Carbon Dioxide Removal, which are science-based benchmarks to drive effective, equitable climate action at scale.
"We have been intentional in designing our projects to make certain all credits are of the highest integrity," Hagen says. "All projects we are developing follow three key principles: they must represent real, measurable changes to our business operations to capture additional carbon, deliver long-term climate benefits and be based on a transparent methodology. We believe these principles are essential to help build a trusted market. And given our unmatched portfolio and expertise at Weyerhaeuser, we are uniquely positioned to scale our credit offerings as companies increasingly look to reduce and offset their emissions and reach their net-zero commitments."