Canada is preparing to join the international carbon market as both buyer and seller. Environment and Climate Change Minister Julie Dabrusin announced on Thursday, September 24, that the government will explore a policy framework to buy and sell internationally transferred mitigation outcomes (ITMOs), the credit class created under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement. The government frames the move as a potential multi-billion-dollar contribution to the Canadian economy and a catalyst for domestic mitigation projects. For a carbon removal sector that has built supply faster than domestic demand, the announcement is the clearest signal yet that Ottawa intends to make Canadian credits an export product.

What Canada Actually Announced

The announcement is deliberately framed as exploration, not regulation. The government will develop a policy framework defining how Canadian entities can participate in Article 6 transactions, both selling mitigation outcomes abroad and buying them to meet domestic objectives.

That two-way design matters. Selling ITMOs requires authorisation and corresponding adjustments, meaning Canada would add exported tonnes back to its own emissions ledger. Buying them gives the federal government, and potentially regulated entities, a tool to meet targets at lower cost. A framework that does both lets Canada arbitrage between its cheap domestic abatement and its expensive, world-class removal capacity.

The timing is not accidental. The announcement lands as Prime Minister Mark Carney pursues deeper economic ties with Europe and Asia in the middle of a trade confrontation with the United States, and carbon market cooperation is an increasingly standard component of those bilateral relationships.

Why Carbon Removal Sits at the Centre

The sector with the most to gain is carbon dioxide removal. Canada has assembled a meaningful CDR industry, including Deep Sky, described as the first company in North America to deliver certified removal credits using direct air capture. Industry group Carbon Removal Canada has been blunt about the structural problem: the domestic buyer pool is small relative to the investment the sector needs.

The numbers make the point. Announced Canadian CDR projects awaiting construction represent roughly 11 million tonnes of removal capacity, according to figures cited by Carbon Removal Canada. Without access to international demand, that pipeline stalls at the financing stage.

An Article 6 framework addresses the bottleneck directly. Clear accounting and authorisation rules would let Canadian removal projects generate credits that qualify as international assets, unlocking buyers that cannot or will not purchase unrecognised voluntary units. For project finance, a government-authorised export channel is worth more than any subsidy announcement, because it converts future tonnes into bankable offtake.

Where the Demand Would Come From

The likely buyers are already visible. The European Union has built a carbon removal certification framework and is debating large-scale public purchase of removal credits. Several Asian countries have expressed interest in cross-border carbon removal supply as they design their own compliance pathways.

Canada would enter this map with structural advantages: geological storage capacity, clean electricity, and an existing federal carbon price that gives removals a domestic value anchor. The open question is price discipline. Host countries that authorise exports must decide how much of their cheapest abatement they are willing to sell, and Canada’s framework will have to answer the same corresponding-adjustment math that has driven Malaysia and other hosts to ration exports.

What It Means for Buyers, Developers and Investors

For corporate buyers, a Canadian ITMO channel would add a new category of compliance-grade removal supply at a moment when demand for high-integrity CDR is concentrated in a handful of voluntary offtake deals. Authorised credits with corresponding adjustments carry a premium, but they also carry a regulatory durability that voluntary units cannot match.

For developers, the framework turns Canada into a more credible host jurisdiction. The practical work now is pipeline readiness: projects that can document robust quantification, permanence and registry-grade data will be first in line for authorisation once the rules exist.

For investors, the signal is that Canada is treating removals as an export industry to be cultivated, not a domestic compliance cost to be minimised. If the framework delivers clear authorisation procedures, expect capital to follow the 11 million tonnes of announced capacity off the drawing board.

What to Watch

Three markers from here. First, the scope of the framework consultation: whether it prioritises removals or covers the full mitigation spectrum will determine which projects benefit first. Second, the authorisation criteria Canada sets for exports, including how it weighs corresponding adjustments against its own NDC. Third, the first bilateral arrangements, with the EU and interested Asian governments the obvious counterparts. A signed deal would convert this week’s policy intent into a tradable market.