Navigating Progression to the Next Stage of the Airport Carbon Accreditation (ACA)

The ACA’s strengthened requirements, introduced in June 2025, have raised expectations around environmental integrity, emissions reductions, and credible use of carbon credits. These updates align with leading voluntary carbon market reforms, including the Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market (ICVCM) Core Carbon Principles. 

This session explores what airports need to know – and do – to progress to the next stage of ACA while embedding climate and nature considerations across the organisation. 

Discussion themes: 

• What is required to progress through the stages of ACA? 
• How to engage your organisation and secure cross‑functional buy‑in. 
• Key challenges in reducing operational and value‑chain emissions. 
• How to communicate your climate and nature journey to external stakeholders with clarity and credibility. 

Why Now?

The April 2026 review is not a weakening of the regulation but a targeted refinement aimed at improving technical guidance, reducing administrative burden on micro and small operators, and enhancing functionality of the EU information system. The regulation’s core obligations – ensuring products are verifiably deforestation‑free – remain unchanged.

With confirmed delays pushing compliance for large companies to 30 December 2026, and SMEs to 30 June 2027, organisations have additional time – but also heightened expectations – to strengthen supply chain transparency and traceability infrastructure.