The government is drafting a decree to amend and supplement several Decree No. 06/2022/NĐ-CP provisions on greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction and ozone layer protection.
The draft decree aims to provide detailed regulations under the Law on Environmental Protection and align with international climate agreements. Its provisions focus on enhancing GHG inventory processes, verifying inventory results, and strengthening emission reduction measures. It also promotes decentralization, simplifies administrative procedures, and reduces business compliance costs in emission inventory verification, mitigation efforts, and emission quota allocation.
Sectoral management ministries will propose annual emission quotas for facilities under their jurisdiction. The Ministry of Agriculture and Environment will compile these proposals and submit them to the Prime Minister for approval of national emission quotas by phase and annually before organizing their allocation to individual facilities.
The draft decree outlines a phased allocation of GHG emission quotas across three periods: 2025-2026, 2027-2028, and 2029-2030. In the initial phase, quotas will be allocated to significant emitters in three key sectors: thermal power, steel production, and cement manufacturing. Approximately 150 facilities will receive quotas in this phase, accounting for about 40% of the country's total GHG emissions.
Revisions to carbon market regulations aim to clarify entities eligible to trade emission quotas and carbon credits. The decree introduces a National Registry System for Emission Quotas and Carbon Credits to support regulatory oversight. It also provides detailed regulations on emission quotas and carbon credit trading on the carbon exchange and defines mechanisms for credit trading and offsetting within the domestic market.
Under the draft decree, sectoral ministries will approve technical guidelines for generating carbon credits, register projects, oversee project participant changes, deregister projects, and issue carbon credits for initiatives within their respective sectors.
New administrative procedures have been added, including verifying GHG inventory results for facilities receiving emission quotas and implementing carbon credit trading and offsetting mechanisms. These procedures have been streamlined to reduce the number of entities required to validate carbon credits and simplify the verification of emission quota allocations.
Regarding ozone layer protection, the draft decree revises and improves six provisions, including: The list of controlled ozone-depleting substances and their phase-out schedules; Registration and reporting requirements for the use of controlled substances; Rules on the allocation, adjustment, and supplementation of production and import quotas for controlled substances; Procedures for distributing, adjusting, supplementing, and revoking production and import quotas for controlled substances; Regulations on the collection, recycling, reuse, and disposal of controlled substances; Responsibilities of stakeholders in managing controlled substances.