Many countries have stated in their INDCs that they intend to use some form of international emissions trading scheme to implement their contributions. In order to ensure the environmental integrity of these transactions, the agreement requires the parties to respect accounting practices and to avoid double counting of “mitigation results transferred internationally.” In addition, the agreement will create a new mechanism that would help contain and support sustainable development and could produce or certify negotiable emission units according to its design. The Paris Agreement provides for a number of binding procedural obligations. The parties are committed to preparing, communicating and maintaining successive NDCs; “domestic mitigation measures” to achieve their NDCs; report regularly on their emissions and on progress in implementing their NDCs. The agreement also provides that the successive NDCs of each party “will represent a progression” beyond their previous one and “reflect its highest possible ambitions.” Obtaining their NDC by a party is not a legally binding obligation. The new research paper from the Ecologic Institute provides a comprehensive overview and assessment of the Paris Agreement, including agreed next steps, implementation prospects and important political messages. It is now available for download. In 2013, at COP 19 in Warsaw, the parties were invited to make their “nationally planned contributions” (INDC) to the Paris Agreement in due course prior to COP 21. These bids represent the mitigation targets set by each country for the period from 2020. The final CNN was submitted by each party after their formal ratification or adoption of the agreement and recorded in a UNFCCC registry. To date, 186 parties have submitted their first NCCs. Negotiations on the Paris regulatory framework at COP 24 proved to some extent to be more difficult than those that led to the Paris Agreement, as the parties faced a range of technical and political challenges and, in some respects, applied more to the development of the general provisions of the agreement through detailed guidelines. Delegates adopted rules and procedures on mitigation, transparency, adaptation, financing, periodic inventories and other Paris provisions.

However, they have failed to agree on rules relating to Article 6, which provides for voluntary cooperation between the parties in the implementation of their NDCs, including by applying market-based approaches.