What we stand for
Supporters of the Gold Standard are committed to promoting sustainable development through carbon offset markets that are characterized by transparency and equality of access for all market participants. To this end, developers of Gold Standard projects are required to use a bottom-up and integrated approach that puts particular emphasis on incorporating feedback from local stakeholder consultations. A central fesure of the Gold Standard method is the Sustainable Development Matrix - a tool that project developers use to check that their projects are designed to make significant contributions to long-term sustainable development and thus qualify to display the Gold Standard logo.
To view the Sustainable Development Matrix, see Annex I in the Toolkit Annexes.
The Gold Standard incorporates all five UNFCCC criteria for Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) carbon offset projects, namely:
- Additionality of emissions reductions compared to the ‘business-as usual’ situation,
- No adverse environmental impact,
- Consistency with host country sustainable development strategy,
- Emissions reduction benefits that are real and measurable, and
- No diversion of ODA to finance carbon offset projects.
It was designed to ensure that the emissions reductions that back up carbon credits are not only real and verifiable, but that the project activities make a measureable impact on sustainable and social development in local communities.
In the voluntary market the Gold Standard provides an assurance that the carbon credits that bear its label are of high quality, and in the compliance market it adds value to the CDM criteria by its provision for documented local stakeholder involvement. For these reasons it is recognized as the benchmark for quality in both voluntary and compliance markets
However, the primary goal of the Gold Standard certification scheme is to use markets for greenhouse gas reductions to bring about a rapid shift from dependence on fossil fuels to a sustainable energy economy, and pull carbon offset markets towards higher quality by regulating and monitoring the impact of emissions reduction projects on sustainable development.