Gold Standard VERs (Verified Emission Reduction Units)
Gold Standard VER's represent 1 tonne of CO2e, that has been produced from a voluntary Gold Standard abatement project.
Initiated by World Wild Life Fund (WWF), SSN and Helio International the Gold Standard for CDM projects was launched in 2003 after a wide-ranging stakeholder consultation with governments and key participants in the carbon markets. A methodology for voluntary offset projects was launched in May 2006.
The Gold Standard is a Swiss based non-profit foundation that supported by a group of 51 NGO's — charitable organisations that work in the Clean Development (CDM), Joint Implementation (JI) and voluntary offset markets to provide a high quality premium carbon credits. It is a non-profit foundation under Swiss law and is funded by public and private donations.
The Gold Standard's objectives are to to help boost investment in sustainable energy projects, ensure significant and lasting contributions to sustainable development, provide assurance that investments have environmental integrity and increase public support for renewable energy and energy efficiency.
The Gold standard and label is based upon a rigorous assessment framework that makes an assessment of the project type, the additionality criteria and its sustainable development.
To be eligible for the Gold Standard the project must be located in any country that does not have a quantitative target under the Kyoto protocol or have a renewable energy or end use energy efficiency improvement classification.
Project developers and proponents must also demonstrate that the emission reductions from the project are "additional" to what would have happened in the absence of the project. To satisfy the later "additionality" the project proponents need to demonstrate that the project would not have occurred without the project being a Gold Standard Voluntary offset due to financial, political or other barriers, the project goes beyond a "business as usual" scenario and that Greenhouse gas emissions are lower with the project rather than without the project.
The Gold Standard builds upon the guidelines given by the UNFCCC CDM Executive Board in its Project Design Document (PDD) and provides purchases of Gold Standard credits the assurance that the projects that they originate from are credible, have real environmental benefits and represent new and additional investments in sustainable energy.
For further information see www.cdmgoldstandard.org.