The European Union’s plan to use international carbon credits to help meet its 2040 climate target could provide a “super solution” to accelerate the rollout of cleaner cooking technologies across the Global South, according to France’s top climate envoy .

With the bloc set to become a “big investor” in carbon credits as a result of its new climate law, efforts to replace polluting cooking stoves with cleaner alternatives could be scaled up, French climate ambassador Benoît Faraco told a summit on clean cooking hosted by the International Energy Agency (IEA).

Faraco said he had discussed that possibility with French fossil fuel giant TotalEnergies, which is involved in clean cooking offsetting programmes in Africa and has major plans to expand the adoption of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) for use in cookstoves in developing countries.

Controversial carbon credits

Starting in 2036, the EU will be allowed to count “high-quality” international carbon credits generated by partner countries under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement towards up to 5% of the emissions reductions required to meet its 2040 target of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 90%. Several climate experts and activists accused the bloc of watering down its commitments by including carbon credits in its climate target for the first time.

The amended climate law adopted in early February says the credits will need to follow “robust safeguards” and “ensure environmental integrity”. The European Commission and its member states have yet to determine which types of credits would qualify or how they would be sourced.

But a French diplomatic source, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Climate Home News that clean cooking should be considered among the sectors to be supported through Article 6 funding, adding that France was willing to engage with its partners on the topic.

Clean cooking credits have regularly faced significant criticism from researchers and campaigners who argue that climate benefits are often exaggerated and weak monitoring can undermine claims of real emission reductions.

“There is a significant risk in trading credits that have repeatedly failed to deliver on their promises, which has been a particular issue with cookstove projects,” said Benja Faecks, an expert at Brussels-based NGO Carbon Market Watch (CMW), adding that it was “far too early” for France to make recommendations on specific credit types.

The French diplomatic source told Climate Home News that France will continue to advocate for the EU to forge partnerships with countries to develop a high-quality carbon credits supply chain.

Total’s cooking gas expansion

Speaking at the IEA summit held in Paris late last month, Faraco said he had discussed the use of carbon credits to fund clean cooking initiatives with TotalEnergies a few days earlier when he joined the French multinational on a visit to deliver LPG cooking units.

TotalEnergies says it is investing over $400 million in LPG infrastructure – including canister storage and filling stations – to give 100 million people in Africa and India access to cleaner cooking alternatives to wood and charcoal.

But while the company promotes the programme as a win for public health and the climate, it also stands to benefit commercially: the rollout would create a vast new market to absorb the growing volumes of oil and gas the company wants to produce across Africa.

In Uganda, where TotalEnergies is leading the development of a major and controversial oil drilling project on the shores of Lake Albert, the French firm says it also provides “affordable” LPG cooking solutions to local communities aiming to avoid “critical deforestation”.

Campaigners have said that gas is not clean nor affordable and pushing its adoption for cooking would lock vulnerable communities into a fossil fuel system. Faecks from CMW said the distribution of LPG cookstoves “very much suits Total’s interests”.

TotalEnergies did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Major carbon market player

The French company has long been involved in carbon markets and, in 2025, spent $73 million to buy carbon credits used to offset, on paper, the greenhouse gas emissions caused by its oil and gas operations.

Last year, it announced that it had partnered with a carbon credit developer to distribute 200,000 cookstoves to households in Rwanda that it said would prevent the emission of more than 2.5 million tons of carbon dioxide over the next 10 years. TotalEnergies will acquire the credits produced by the project and use them from 2030 to offset some of its direct emissions.

“Clean cooking contributes to long-term social, economic and human development in a more sustainable way,” Arnaud Le Foll, senior vice-president new business and carbon neutrality at TotalEnergies, said at the time.

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EU carbon credits could supercharge world’s clean cooking push, France says