Verra’s revamped forest offset programme comes under fire
- Media Manager
- May 4, 2023
- 2 min read
Climate Home News
Published: May 4th, 2023
The world’s leading carbon credits certifier has drawn up new rules for its much-criticised forest protection programmes.
Verra says the new methodology will ensure that the programmes are actually protecting as many trees as those buying and selling the carbon credits they produce claim.
But experts told Climate Home that the new rules will not fix the conflicts of interest which undermine these programmes and that the way Verra is carrying out its review of the rules is flawed.
Forest offsets
Carbon credits are when companies, governments and people pay for someone else to cut greenhouse gas emissions on their behalf, so they can take credit for this climate action.
Organisations like Verra are supposed to check whether projects actually reduce the amount of emissions that they claim.
Projects which aim to reduce emissions by saving forests, allowing them to keep sucking in planet-destroying carbon dioxide, make up much of Verra’s credits portfolio.
Project developers estimate what would have happened if the conservation project had not existed. The ‘avoided’ emissions are then turned into credits to be sold to polluters. Verra approves the projects and advertises them for sale on its website, receiving a fee for each transaction.
Under fire
But in January, a Guardian investigation alleged in January that more than 90% of its rainforest offset credits are likely to be ‘phantom credits’ and do not represent genuine carbon reductions.
It found that most projects overstated the threats to forests which calculations are based on and did not show real evidence that they had saved the forest.
Verra disputed the investigation’s findings and said it was already working to transition all forest projects to one updated methodology.
More than three years in the works, Verra finally unveiled its draft rules in mid-April. They are expected to be finalised by the end of the year, before coming into force in 2025.
