Emissions and Carbon Desk Academy
Twenty courses. Beginner to advanced. No course assumes what it has not taught.
The learner must be able to defend a specific carbon procurement decision under challenge on four fronts at once: the quality framework behind the unit, the certainty of delivery, the exposure to reversal, and the claim the buyer is permitted to make.
20 courses · 100 to 130 chapters each · every chapter one 8 to 10 minute explainer · self-paced
Twenty courses in dependency order
A course may only assume capability taught by a lower-numbered course, and the level column never falls as you move down the table.
| # | Course | Level | Builds on | What this course owns |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | Market foundations | |||
| 01 | Carbon Markets & Instruments | 1/10 | none | The instrument taxonomy that separates allowances from credits, and the market roles and venues each one trades through. |
| 02 | Emissions Quantities, Boundaries & Evidence | 1/10 | 01 | How an emissions quantity is defined, bounded, measured and evidenced before any trade or claim rests on it. |
| 03 | Compliance Market Architecture | 2/10 | 01, 02 | How a cap-and-trade scheme is constructed: coverage, cap setting, allocation method, surrender cycle and oversight bodies. |
| 04 | Voluntary Market & Project Lifecycle | 2/10 | 01, 02 | The project pathway from methodology selection and validation through monitoring, verification and issuance. |
| B | Obligation, custody and counterparty assessment | |||
| 05 | Compliance Obligations & Allowance Procurement | 3/10 | 01, 02, 03 | Translating a regulated entity's obligation into an allowance procurement plan and a surrender calendar. |
| 06 | Registries, Transfers & Retirement | 3/10 | 03, 04, 05 | Account structure, unit serialisation, transfer, retirement and cancellation mechanics, and the audit trail they produce. |
| 07 | Credit Quality & Due Diligence | 4/10 | 02, 04, 06 | The quality assessment framework for a credit, covering additionality, baseline, permanence, leakage and verification strength, and the diligence file that evidences it. |
| 08 | Purchase Agreements & Delivery Risk | 4/10 | 04, 06, 07 | The commercial contract for credit purchase and the allocation of delivery, shortfall and non-performance risk between the parties. |
| C | Price formation, hedging and procurement economics | |||
| 09 | Market Balances, Auctions & Price Drivers | 5/10 | 01, 03, 05 | Supply and demand balance construction, primary auction mechanics, and the drivers that set price formation. |
| 10 | Allowance Futures, Options & Hedging | 5/10 | 01, 05, 09 | Listed allowance derivatives and the construction, margining and effectiveness testing of a compliance hedge. |
| 11 | Credit Pricing, Vintages & Delivery Terms | 6/10 | 07, 08, 09 | Differential pricing across project type, vintage, co-benefit profile and delivery term, and the curve a buyer or seller quotes from. |
| 12 | Corporate Carbon Procurement | 6/10 | 02, 07, 11 | The corporate buyer operating model: mandate, budget cycle, internal approval route, supplier panel and procurement governance. |
| D | Structured purchase, financing and portfolio specialisation | |||
| 13 | Emissions Reduction Purchase Agreements | 7/10 | 04, 08, 11 | Long-dated offtake structuring with a project counterparty, including volume flexibility, milestone conditions and termination. |
| 14 | Prepayment, Offtake Financing and Working Capital | 7/10 | 08, 11, 13 | Prepaid and financed credit purchase: advance structures, security and recourse, drawdown conditions and the working capital exposure carried until delivery. |
| 15 | Removals & Durability Economics | 8/10 | 04, 07, 11 | The cost and risk economics of durable removal, including reversal risk, buffer pool mechanics and monitoring over long horizons. |
| 16 | Credit Portfolio Construction | 8/10 | 10, 11, 15 | Building and rebalancing a multi-project, multi-vintage portfolio against concentration, delivery and budget limits. |
| E | Integrity, stress and integrated practice | |||
| 17 | Article 6 & Cross-Border Transactions | 9/10 | 03, 06, 07 | Internationally transferred units, authorisation and corresponding adjustment mechanics, and host country transaction structuring. |
| 18 | Claims, Integrity & Buyer Communications | 9/10 | 07, 15, 17 | What a retired unit permits a buyer to say, and the substantiation, disclosure and assurance that stands behind that statement. |
| 19 | Policy Shocks, Reversals & Counterparty Stress | 10/10 | 09, 15, 16, 18 | Stress and scenario testing a carbon book against rule change, reversal events and counterparty failure. |
| 20 | Integrated Carbon Simulation | 10/10 | 14, 16, 18, 19 | The end-to-end desk simulation in which a complete procurement decision is taken and then defended under examination. |
Every course states the capability it owns. The brochure carries the same table plus the chapter list behind each course, which is the quickest way to find the course that teaches the thing you cannot currently do.
The whole desk end to end, in one programme
The twenty courses take one capability at a time, in dependency order, for someone building from the ground up. The Emissions & Carbon Trading Desk Master Programme does the opposite: it runs the whole carbon desk front to back in a single sequence, for someone who already works on a desk and wants the shape of the job quickly rather than the long route.
Take whichever matches your starting point. They cover the same ground and several of the numbered courses draw on the same material.
Take one course, or the whole pathway
Each course stands alone. Taken in order, the twenty build one desk capability from no prior knowledge.