As the first-ever CRCF Days unfold in Brussels, day 1 of the event put an accent on the EU carbon dioxide removal (CDR) Buyers’ Club and how this initiative is set to become a pillar of Europe’s CO2 removal market.
Hosted by the European Commission’s DG CLIMA, this multi-stakeholder forum brings together buyers, project developers, financiers, and Member State representatives to advance the implementation of the EU’s Carbon Removal Certification Framework (CRCF).
In February 2026, the European Commission adopted the first certification methodologies for permanent carbon removals under the CRCF regulation. With the regulatory framework in place, the attention has now shifted to implementation.
The EU Commission will soon begin recognising the certification schemes with the intent of implementing the newly adopted methodologies. This would mark the next concrete step in the process of operationalising the CRCF.
Providing first-hand takeaways from Brussels, Carbon Management Europe notes that day 1 of the two-day event was dedicated to permanent removals. Throughout the sessions, the design of an EU Carbon Removal Buyers’ Club to close the CDR financing gap emerged as the most concrete near-term priority.
Specifically, day 1 looked into the key conditions to facilitate the implementation and scale high-quality CDRs, namely boosting private demand, financing, building infrastructure, and member state action to accelerate supply and demand.
During the second session of the day, Carbon Gap introduced design options for a EU Carbon Removal Buyers’ Club, drawing on their newly published paper in collaboration with Carbon Management Europe.
Proposed as a coordination mechanism, the EU CDR Buyers’ Club will serve to aggregate corporate demand, reduce transaction costs, and provide the revenue certainty that permanent CI2 removal projects need to reach Final Investment Decision.
“The EU’s CRCF is soon operational and will help to build the foundation for scaling permanent carbon removals across policy streams. The missing piece is a credible demand signal, and the EU Carbon Removal Buyers’ Club is the most concrete near-term instrument to provide it.”
– Eve Tamme, Chair, Carbon Management Europe (formerly ZEP).
Relevant: New Paper Examines How An EU CDR Buyers’ Club Could Drive Demand In This Region
Eadbhard Pernot, Secretary General at Carbon Management Europe (formerly ZEP)”, added, “The EU has been a global leader in certifying permanent carbon removal. Now it has a chance to build demand for permanent carbon removal as a pillar in our climate architecture.”
At the CRCF event, discussions also circulated around the financing conditions required to make projects bankable, with long-term revenue certainty and blended finance mechanisms deemed as critical to project bankability.
On the topic of infrastructure, scaling removal volumes via pathways such as Direct air capture and storage (DACCS) or biogenic CO2 capture and storage (BioCCS) was shown to be directly contingent on the speed of CO2 transport and storage infrastructure build-out.
Another highlight from the first day of the event, Carbon Management Europe shares, was the role of Member States in enabling CDR demand, as well as the need of coordinated action between Member States and the EU as a vital building block to a coherent and ambitious European CDR market.
