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At the moment, Core Carbon Principles (CCP)-tagged cookstove credits command a premium over spot and forward CORSIA Phase 1 (CP1)-eligible credits.
Fastmarkets’ price assessment for cookstove CCP, Sub Saharan Africa, was $15 per tCO2e on Tuesday May 26, a premium of $4.45 per tCO2e over the price assessment for CORSIA Phase 1, which was $10.55 per tCO2e on May 27. This premium has been widening since the CCP cookstove assessment was launched at the end of April, a time when CORSIA prices dropped significantly.
But the higher price point for CCP-tagged cookstove credits was offset by significant reductions in credit issuances, due to the application of a standardized fraction of non-renewable biomass (fNRB) values obtained from the ‘Modelling fuelwood savings scenarios’ (MoFuSS) tool.
This is also used as a basis to develop TOOL33, a methodological tool approved by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)’s Article 6.4 Supervisory Body for default values of common parameters.
Meanwhile, CORSIA markets have been plagued by delays in airlines’ compliance demand translating into active procurement, despite continued expectations of tighter longer-term supply.
These factors were forcing developers to decide whether to prioritize pricing or volumes when bringing projects to market, as well as whether to target compliance demand from airlines or to rely on demand from the voluntary sector.
Projects targeting CORSIA Phase 1 eligibility faced additional upfront costs, including corresponding adjustment fees of around $5 per tCO2e, and sometimes an additional insurance cost of $1.00-1.50 per tCO2e.
While these costs were typically embedded in pricing, developers could avoid insurance charges if credits were formally adjusted in host countries’ Biennial Transparency Reports, improving net returns. But because these reports are only submitted to the UN every two years, this route can be more time-consuming and involve detailed work with the host government, especially where carbon market frameworks and reporting are still in their infancy.
Even so, the CORSIA route often required developers to factor these costs into their sales strategy, in contrast to CCP pathways, where the main compromise comes through reduced issuance volumes and therefore a higher marginal production cost per credit.
Achieving CCP eligibility required cookstove projects to move to updated ICVCM approved methodologies, as well as shifting from TOOL 30 to TOOL 33 for calculating the fNRB, a key input for determining emissions reductions.
This transition significantly lowers fNRB values and therefore credit output, with average reductions of around 50% under Verra and 47% under Gold Standard projects. But these cuts can change dramatically based on geography, making developing projects in some countries much less economic.
The result was a structural constraint on CCP supply, effectively tightening volumes while raising unit prices.
Revenue optimization between CCP and CORSIA pathways varies widely by country, reflecting differences in fNRB adjustments and cost structures.
The first graph below illustrates the average difference in fNRB, country by country, that can be expected when projects registered under Verra and Gold Standard shift to using Tool 33 default values.
Countries on the right of the graph will be seeing the highest volume adjustment while updating their fNRB values, such as India, where the average fNRB across projects listed on Verra and Gold Standard is 83.7%. The Tool 33 directed default fNRB value was 7%, leading to one of the highest percentage differences at 76.7%.
Because the fNRB value was directly proportional to the number of credits issued to a project, the marginal production cost per credit for a cookstove project based in India will go up by about 12 times, meaning that developers would need prices to rise by a similar factor under the CCP pathway to achieve the same overall revenues.
Similarly, the difference in fNRB for Zimbabwe was 70%, Rwanda 59.6%, Kenya 55% and Uganda 47%, indicating the average volumetric cut that a project from these countries will see when updating their fNRB and moving to a CCP-approved methodology.
When considering revenues for a project under legacy methodologies moving to either a CCP-aligned pathway (with volumetric reductions) or a CORSIA pathway (with corresponding adjustment and insurance fees), a more nuanced equilibrium emerges.
Fastmarkets’ analysis, considering revenues generated per tCO2e with respect to the two pathways, suggested that countries such as Tanzania, Malawi, Ghana, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Nigeria, Vietnam, Nepal and Uganda were better placed to benefit from CCP adoption, where higher prices outweigh volume losses.
Conversely, Kenya, Rwanda and Namibia may favor the CORSIA route, particularly if corresponding adjustments were already in place and insurance costs could be avoided.
Certain markets, including Papua-New Guinea, Cambodia, Zimbabwe, Thailand, India and Colombia, exhibit such steep declines in fNRB values under CCP methodologies that CORSIA-linked credits deliver stronger overall revenues.
Kenya was as a key example of the difference, with relatively high fNRB reductions making CORSIA-aligned cookstove projects economically more attractive than CCP alternatives, only if the credits are already reported as correspondingly adjusted. However, some developers in the country have already decided to change to CCP rather than CORSIA because of concerns over potential timelines and eligibility for LoAs from the country’s government.
But recent volatility in CORSIA pricing meant that the preferred pathways for these countries may evolve with such price movements. Notably, prices for CP1 assessed credits have fallen to $10.75 per tCO2e from $23.20 per tCO2e in only seven months.
Developers will need to account for this price volatility when making decisions about which path to take. Being flexible or targeting both pathways could allow them to take advantage of any sudden price fluctuations in the future.
The above interplay between CCP and CORSIA pathways was also strongly influenced by the price realization of the credit types.
The CP1 assessed price was at its highest, at $23.20 per tCO2e, in October 2025. Comparing revenues at this price with revenues from CCP cookstoves, assuming a price of $15 per tCO2e, would show the CORSIA pathway as the preferred contender because of the volumetric cuts related to the CCP pathways.
Fastmarkets’ analysis also indicated that if CORSIA prices returned to these levels, CCP cookstove prices would need to reach around $24.80 per tCO2e (a premium of $1.60 per tCO2e) before developers would see a revenue benefit through the CCP route over CORSIA, without insurance for some geographies on the left-hand side of the graph.
It should be noted that these values are based on assuming the corresponding adjustment fees at $5 per tCO2e, as seen in some west African countries, and insurance fees of around $1.50 per tCO2e. Any variance in these underlying values, and any additional share of revenue with local jurisdictions, would give different results.
Similarly, at the recently assessed price of $10.75 per tCO2e, which was also CORSIA’s lowest level yet, CCP prices could fall to just $7.80 per tCO2e – a $2.95 per tCO2e discount to the CORSIA price. This would still see developers achieve a higher overall revenue through the CCP route in countries such as Senegal and the Philippines.
This showed that the CCP cookstove value at which it started to affect the optimized revenue pathway for a cookstove project was dynamic, and depended on the price achieved for CORSIA credits.
The analysis also found that, for the current set of countries and their characteristic fNRB differences, the threshold for CORSIA price was $18.80-18.90 per tCO2e. This meant that if CORSIA values fell below this price point, CCP prices could be at a discount to CORSIA prices, but still be the preferred option in some geographies.
Despite the narrower margins in some regions, CCP pathways retained strategic flexibility. Credits developed under CCP-compliant methodologies may still be eligible for CORSIA in later phases, particularly if future eligibility criteria were to tighten and converge with CCP standards.
The availability of this option could prove valuable while compliance-driven demand evolved, while potential tightening of EU rules couold also expand demand for higher-integrity credits across both pathways.
The interplay between CCP integrity premiums and CORSIA compliance costs was likely to remain a defining feature of cookstove markets, with developers increasingly making jurisdiction-specific decisions based on revenue optimization, rather than using a single global strategy.
If CCPs gain traction as a quality benchmark for voluntary retirees, the market could be expected to split along geographic and methodological lines, with price premiums, policy alignment and issuance volumes jointly determining project viability.
Notably, project developers theoretically have this choice for credits belonging to vintages no later than 2025 in Gold Standard, because it required all cookstove projects to update their fNRB values in alignment with Tool 33 after December 31, 2025, and for vintages no later than 2026 in Verra, because it required all cookstove projects for vintage 2027 to deploy its latest CCP approved cookstove methodology (VM0050), which uses the updated fNRB values.
The current VM0050 methodology still allowed use of the older TOOL 30 calculation for fNRB, although this was under revision.
Additionally, a draft concept note from the European Commission in April this year introduced the possibility of stricter eligibility criteria for CORSIA credits for European airlines, effectively restricting cookstove projects to CCP approved methodologies.
This would mean that, to be eligible for the proposed European CORSIA phase 1 criteria, a cookstove project would have to be from a CCP-eligible methodology (take a volumetric cut) and to pay a corresponding adjustment and insurance fee if required.
These restrictions were similar to the eligibility criteria for CORSIA Phase 2. Fastmarkets has heard of developers hoping to see prices of $20-25 per tCO2e for CORSIA Phase 2 eligible units. Getting a headstart on both CCP and CORSIA eligibility could lead to significant premiums for project developers, even in CORSIA’s current phase.
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