Project developers can now sign up for Verra’s Scope 3 registry

The world’s largest issuer of voluntary carbon market credits is gearing up to launch a registry for an emerging type of credit that’s used to decarbonize supply chains.

Verra announced this week that project developers can begin the process of applying to issue what the nonprofit calls Scope 3 Units. The units, also known as environmental attribute certificates (EACs), are used by companies to claim the emissions savings generated by investments in supply-chain projects.

The registry plans on issuing its first Scope 3 Units next year and hopes to have “dozens, if not hundreds” of projects generating millions of the units around three years from now, said Stefan Jirka, Verra’s director for agriculture and supply chain innovation. Verra currently has more than 2,500 projects issuing credits under its voluntary carbon market standard.

Scope 3 solution

The move is the latest sign that EACs will play an increasingly important role in reducing value-chain, or Scope 3, emissions, which constitute the bulk of many corporate footprints but are challenging to tackle because companies have limited influence over suppliers.

Attribute credits provide flexibility by allowing companies to count emissions savings against Scope 3 inventories even when the buyer cannot demonstrate a direct supply-chain connection to the project it invested in. Buyers instead have to meet a less stringent association test, such as demonstrating they purchase from suppliers in the region in which they invested.

Companies have been hesitant to purchase EACs until leading standard-setters, including the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), approved the approach. SBTi did so in June in an update to its Corporate Net-Zero Standard, a decision that gave PepsiCo the confidence to include EACs in its 2025 emissions statement, released last month.

Proliferating projects

It’s unclear how many other companies will immediately follow PepsiCo’s lead, however. SBTi’s decision signaled that EACs can count toward emissions targets, but there is no single set of rules on what credits companies can buy and how they should include them in their carbon accounts. 

Instead, multiple players are working on overlapping projects. One cross-sector initiative — the Advanced and Indirect Mitigation Platform — has released guidelines, and the Greenhouse Gas Protocol is developing its position on use of the credits. For-profit players include Athian, which issues EACs for livestock projects, and S3 Markets, an EAC registry.

Verra’s efforts leverage its existing methodologies for agricultural land management and low-carbon concrete production projects, which it adapted so that developers can use them to generate Scope 3 Units. Additional methodologies for Scope 3 projects in forestry, industrial fuels, superpollutants and refrigeration will follow, the organization said. It’s also working on rules that will govern which companies can purchase specific units.