Since January 2025, AlliedOffsets data has recorded a sustained increase in both the number of unique buyers and the volume of retirements from Russian entities in the voluntary carbon market. Russia has made very few new emissions reduction policies in recent years and, as a country, is targeting net zero by 2060, relying heavily on forestry projects to get there. Against that backdrop, this uptick is worth examining.
The numbers are still relatively low, 22 unique known buyers and 72,040 retired credits since the start of 2025. But in a country with no domestic regulation pushing companies toward voluntary offsetting, and one still largely preoccupied with its war on Ukraine, any sustained movement in this direction stands out.
Who's buying?
Gazprom dominates, and it isn't particularly close. The majority state-owned energy corporation and one of the world's largest natural gas producers sits far ahead of every other Russian buyer in both the 2025 and all-time data. As a state-owned company, Gazprom aligns its low-carbon activities with Russia's national climate goals and has measurable targets and action plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
Russia Top 10 buyers by sector 2025
Russia Top 10 buyers by sector all time
Beyond Gazprom, the 2025 buyer list includes ICS, a heat supply organization for the Dolinsky city district, Roscongress Foundation, Russian Railways, and TransContainer. The all-time picture brings in Rusal and Novatek Green Energy too. Energy, mining, transport, public sector: the spread across sectors is broader than the headline Gazprom figure suggests.
Why is Roscongress Foundation buying carbon credits?
Roscongress sitting third in the 2025 data is interesting. It is a state-backed institution established by presidential decision in 2007 and one of Russia's largest organizers of international economic forums, including the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum and the Eastern Economic Forum. Not an obvious carbon credit buyer on paper, but it has prior form. In 2023, Roscongress and SIBUR agreed to transfer carbon units to completely offset the Eastern Economic Forum's carbon footprint, making it the largest carbon neutral economic forum in Russia with confirmed international verification. Its 2025 activity looks like a continuation of that commitment rather than anything new.
Sakhalin: Russia's carbon policy testing ground
Part of the answer to the "why" question sits with Sakhalin. The island became the first region in Russia to set carbon quotas, with the explicit aim of serving as a testing ground for carbon regulation that could eventually be rolled out at a national level.
The quota system currently applies to 35 large regional companies emitting more than 20,000 tons annually, with a penalty of 1,000 rubles ($13) per ton for exceeding the limit. By global standards, the carbon price is low, but what matters here is the direction of travel. If the framework extends beyond Sakhalin, which is the intention, domestic demand for credits grows with it.
There is also an external dimension: export-oriented Russian companies continue to face pressure from trading partners in Asia and the Middle East to demonstrate progress on carbon footprint, independent of what is or isn't happening in domestic policy.
No regulation requires Russian companies to purchase voluntary carbon credits, the geopolitical context hasn't changed, and the volumes are still modest. But the buyer base is growing and diversifying across sectors and that's happening entirely off the back of voluntary corporate decision-making. As the Sakhalin framework develops and Russia's domestic carbon policy slowly takes shape, it will be worth seeing whether that changes the scale of what we're looking at.