London, 13 March: The registry for Gold Standard voluntary emission reductions (VERs) was formally launched on Tuesday, in the latest move to improve transparency in the burgeoning voluntary carbon market.
The Gold Standard offers a premium label to carbon projects, including those under the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and Joint Implementation (JI), and offers a guarantee to credit buyers that the project contributes to sustainable development. It was established in 2003 by NGO WWF, project developer SouthSouthNorth (SSN) and Helio International, a network of energy analysts committed to sustainable development. It is one of a series of such standards developed to assure the quality of carbon credits.
The VER registry will create, track and allow trading of Gold Standard VERs globally, and will also act as a project database for CDM and JI projects which meet the standard, and track the issuance of carbon credits to these projects.
“As one of the initiators of the Gold Standard, we are fully supportive of this new tool for a credible voluntary carbon market,” said Martin Hiller, Swiss-based communications manager for WWF International and president of the Gold Standard board.
Registry users will also be able to track the status of voluntary, CDM and JI projects, details of issued credits and retired credits.
The registry will be managed by APX, a US-based platform provider for the energy and environmental markets. The company was awarded the contract for the Gold Standard’s VER registry last year.
Updated 13 March 2008
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