Uncertainty around CORSIA has dropped in the past week. Regulators have dropped a planned tightening of credit-quality rules for the scheme’s first compliance phase, and confirmed its role in international aviation policy through to 2035. Prices for CORSIA-eligible credits jumped in response, as buyers regained confidence that had been missing for months.
Both decisions came from the European Commission on 17 July 2026, folded into a broader proposal reforming the EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS). The first eliminates additional credit-quality criteria that had been proposed for CORSIA’s initial compliance phase, spanning 2024 to 2026 emissions; the same criteria remain slated for phase two, starting in 2027. Commission officials called the reversal “a constructive gesture of goodwill,” framed as a bid to win support for the broader package ahead of an autumn vote. The second decision extends CORSIA’s legal footing to 2035 and lengthens the window in which airlines can deduct CORSIA credit costs from their EU ETS bill, sidestepping a double charge on the same tonne of emissions.
A wider threat to the scheme has also been scaled back. Earlier drafts floated bringing all flights departing Europe under the EU ETS from 2029; the final proposal instead applies EU carbon pricing only to flights landing within 5,000 kilometres of Frankfurt, still from 2029 and for a four-year window. Routes to North America, East Asia, and South America fall outside that radius. Whether the zone narrows further depends on a Commission review due by 1 July 2032, which will assess whether CORSIA’s participating states have reached 70% of international aviation emissions. A separate change lowers the exemption threshold for aircraft operators, drawing private jets and smaller airlines into carbon pricing for the first time.
Spot prices for CORSIA’s first-phase credits rose from $9.70 to $11.60 per tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2e) in the week following the announcements, data shows. Buyers had held off purchases for months pending clarity on both the quality criteria and the scope of any EU ETS expansion. The proposal now moves into negotiation between the Commission, the Council, and the European Parliament, a process that typically runs for a year or longer, with the Commission targeting a conclusion by the end of 2026.