In short: Offsetting lets you claim a tonne that was avoided or removed somewhere else. It does nothing to the emissions of your plant, fleet or supply chain. SBTi's new net-zero standard, ISO 14068 and EU Directive 2024/825 all push credits to the end of the line, so measure first, reduce second and neutralize only what is left with high-quality credits.
What a carbon credit buys, and what it doesn't
A carbon credit represents one tonne of CO2e that a project avoided or removed relative to a baseline. When you retire it in a registry in your name, you gain the right to count that tonne against your own emissions.
Credits come from two families. Avoidance projects, such as renewable power, landfill gas capture or avoided deforestation, prevent emissions that would otherwise occur. Removal projects, such as reforestation, biochar or direct air capture with geological storage, pull carbon out of the atmosphere and store it. They differ in permanence and cost, and one should not stand in for the other.
What a credit cannot do is just as clear. It doesn't lower your energy bill, improve your kiln's efficiency or reduce the embedded emissions of the product you ship to the EU. Next year you pay again for the same emissions. The instrument is fine. Using it in place of reduction is the problem.
How the 2026 rules treat offsetting
Three documents now lock credits into the last step.
- SBTi Corporate Net-Zero Standard V2.0. Published on June 11, 2026, effective February 1, 2027, with V1 open for target setting until the end of 2027. It states that credits cannot replace reductions in the physical inventory and requires residual emissions at the net-zero year to be neutralized with carbon removals. The V1 idea of beyond value chain mitigation (BVCM) now sits under a broader "ongoing emissions responsibility" (OER), which becomes mandatory for large Category A companies from 2035 (SBTi, V2.0 text).
- ISO 14068. ISO 14068-1:2023, published in November 2023, was the first international standard for carbon neutrality. In September 2026 it was replaced by ISO 14068:2026, which still ranks value-chain reductions and removals ahead of offsetting and accepts offsetting only for the remaining footprint (ISO, ISO 14068:2026).
- EU Directive 2024/825 on empowering consumers for the green transition. Member states had to transpose it by March 27, 2026, and the rules have applied since September 27, 2026. Claiming that a product has a neutral, reduced or positive greenhouse gas impact on the basis of offsetting is now an unfair commercial practice in all circumstances (EUR-Lex, 2024/825).
In practice, "carbon neutral thanks to credits" is no longer a lawful product claim toward EU consumers. At the corporate level, you are expected to show separately which reductions, which boundary and which credits a claim rests on.
How to tell a good credit from a weak one
Not every credit represents the same tonne. The Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market (ICVCM) published ten Core Carbon Principles (CCPs) as a common quality benchmark (ICVCM). The ones that matter most in a purchasing decision:
- Additionality: Would the project have happened without carbon revenue?
- Permanence: If stored carbon is released again, how is that risk covered?
- Robust quantification: Is the baseline conservative and documented?
- No double counting: Is the same tonne also counted by another buyer or the host country?
- Independent verification and a transparent registry: Was the project verified by a third party, and is your retirement publicly recorded?
A CCP-labelled methodology has already answered most of these questions for you. Price is a weak quality signal; a cheap credit can hide an inflated baseline.
Net zero and carbon neutrality are different claims
Carbon neutrality describes a state in which a period's emissions are balanced by an equal amount of reductions or removals. ISO 14068 ties it to a reduction commitment, but the claim itself is about a balance over a period.
Net zero is a transformation target. Under SBTi it requires deep absolute cuts across Scopes 1, 2 and 3 and expects the small residual to be neutralized with durable removals. One says "we balanced the books this year." The other says "we moved the business onto a 1.5°C-aligned pathway."
They also fail differently. Offset-based neutrality depends every year on the quality of the credits bought and on how regulators read the wording. A tonne actually taken out of operations does not come back because of a press story or a registry review.
What it means for manufacturers exporting to the EU
For exporters, this goes past reputation and into cost.
CBAM. The definitive period began on January 1, 2026. EU importers above the annual 50-tonne threshold for iron and steel, aluminium, cement and fertilizers must be authorized CBAM declarants. The first annual declaration, covering 2026 imports, is due by September 30, 2027, and certificate sales start on February 1, 2027. The mechanism allows a deduction for a carbon price effectively paid in the country of origin. A voluntary credit you retire does not reduce your product's embedded emissions or what your EU buyer pays. Measured, verified and actually reduced installation-level emissions do. See our CBAM service page for details.
Türkiye's own system. Climate Law No. 7552, published on July 9, 2025, created a national emissions trading system, and the ETS Regulation followed on August 27, 2026, covering installations above 50,000 tCO2e a year. The law allows part of the obligation to be met with national carbon credits, with the limits set in secondary rules. Credits never stand in for a verified inventory.
The order that holds up
You don't have to give up credits. You have to put them at the end of a sequence that puts reduction first.
- Measure. Build a GHG Protocol-aligned inventory across Scopes 1, 2 and 3, with documented activity data and emission factor sources. Companies reporting to CDP put their supply chain emissions at 26 times their operational emissions on average (CDP, 2024), so a target that leaves out Scope 3 emissions misses most of the picture.
- Reduce. Efficiency, electrification, renewable power procurement, process and material changes, supplier engagement. Let cost and speed set the order.
- Work on what today's technology can't remove. Process emissions and high-temperature heat call for product design, input changes and sector collaboration.
- Neutralize the rest. Use CCP-aligned credits only for residual emissions, shift the mix toward removals over time, and disclose gross emissions, reductions and neutralized volume as separate figures.
A program built in this order holds up with the same data in a CBAM declaration, a customer questionnaire and an assurance review. If you want to see where your inventory stands today and how many credits you actually need, talk to our team.