Nitric Acid Production Project Protocol Public Workshop Webinar on November 3

Public comment period open for draft Landfill Project Protocol Version 3.0

Forest Project Protocol Version 3.1 is now available

Landfill and Livestock Project Verification Training

Title: Landfill and Livestock Project Verification Training
Location: Los Angeles, Pacific Center Ballroom
Start Date: November 19-20, 2009
Start Time: 8:00 AM PDT
End Time: 5:00 PM PDT

Description:
This training is designed to qualify verifiers to perform project verifications under the Climate Action Reserve’s Landfill and Livestock Project Protocols. The purpose is to provide a consistent understanding of the Reserve’s expectations for the proper verification procedures. This course will provide a brief summary of project accounting concepts and principles, performance monitoring and reporting instructions, protocol eligibility requirements, calculating baselines, performing core verification activities and procedures for completing verification within the Reserve.
Participants who complete the course and pass the final exam will fulfill a significant eligibility requirement to be qualified as a Lead Project Verifier.

Note: This course assumes that all participants have experience and knowledge on GHG verification and starts from an advanced level. Individuals desiring training on basic GHG verifier skills should take an outside course and/or rely on their verification body’s own internal practices to gain GHG verification experience.

For any individual to be qualified as a Lead Verifier and eligible to conduct verification activities under the Reserve, he/she must meet the following criteria:

Attend and successfully complete a required Project Verifier training under the Climate Action Reserve protocols (receive a Certificate of Completion for the training course)
Be employed or subcontracted to a verification body accredited under ISO 14065 OR an another approved verification body under the Climate Action Reserve
Meet the internal training requirements, following the proper processes and procedures under their ISO 14065 accredited verification body or their approved verification body under the Reserve
Be identified as “Lead Verifier” in the Designated Staff roster submitted by their verification body to reserve@climateactionreserve.org

Course Requirements
In preparation for this course, all participants should:

Understand WRI’s GHG Project Protocol
Have read the Reserve’s Landfill and Livestock Reporting and Verification Protocols
Bring a laptop to take the course examination

Course Overview
Please be aware as you are making your travel plans that this session will only proceed if we receive a minimum of 10 participants. The Reserve will notify you at least 2 weeks prior if the session will proceed. Also, the session will conclude with a mandatory, timed exam from 3:00-5:00 PM. You must sit and pass the exam to receive a Certificate of Completion and to be qualified as a Lead Verifier under the Climate Action Reserve; there are no exceptions. If you do not wish to take the exam, you may leave at 3:00 PM and receive a Certificate of Attendance. Any individual who does not pass the exam will also receive a Certificate of Attendance.

Exam Time: 2 hours
Part 1: Multiple choice (30 minutes)
Part 2: Short essay (30 minutes)
Part 3: Data interpretation exercise (60 minutes) *For those wishing to re-take the exam from previous project verifier trainings, you may do so at this time by paying a $200 re-sit fee OR contact the Programs Team to find another possible time.*

To sign up for the next training contact Peter Browning @ peter@climateactionreserve.org or (213) 542-0297

Payment Information
The price of this training is $1,300.00 USD. You will be supplied with a credit card authorization form once you have successfully completed your registration. Please email our webmaster for any help.

Payment Information

The price of this training is $1,300.00 USD. You will be supplied with a credit card authorization form once you have successfully completed your registration. Please email our webmaster for any help.

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Landfill Project Protocol Version 2.1 is now available

Public comment period open for draft Nitric Acid Production Project Protocol

Organic waste and coal mine methane projects now eligible to register with the Climate Action Reserve

Adoption of two new protocols expands the types of high quality offset credits issued in the US voluntary carbon market

SACRAMENTO, CA – The Climate Action Reserve Board of Directors unanimously adopted the Organic Waste Digestion (OWD) and Coal Mine Methane (CMM) Project Protocols and broadened the reach and diversity of offset projects that can be registered with the premier offsets registry. The two protocols provide financial incentives for implementing activities that help mitigate climate change and that go beyond usual business practices in the solid waste and coal mine sectors.

“With the adoption of the Organic Waste Digestion and Coal Mine Methane Project Protocols, the Climate Action Reserve now offers eight protocols for use in generating high quality offsets. In dealing with the urgent issue of climate change, we need credible, practical solutions that truly provide benefit to the environment. All of the Reserve protocols, including the two newest ones, provide comprehensive tools that allow us to work together in addressing climate change and generate immediate benefits to the environment,” said Linda Adams, Chair of the Climate Action Reserve Board of Directors and Secretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency.

Food waste decomposes rapidly in landfills and is a major source of methane emissions, which are over 21 times more potent to the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. Currently, less than three percent of food waste in the U.S. is diverted. The OWD Project Protocol is the nation’s first protocol to incentivize the diversion of food waste from landfills. It provides a standardized approach for quantifying, monitoring and verifying greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions from organic waste diversion projects. Instead of organic waste being buried in landfills, where it will produce and emit methane, it is diverted into anaerobic digesters. The protocol also allows for the capture and destruction of methane at industrial wastewater treatment facilities.

“Diverting food scraps from landfills to anaerobic digesters not only directly reduces potent greenhouse gases, but also provides clean fuels and renewable energy to help the state meet its climate goals,” said Nick Lapis, Policy Associate, Californians Against Waste.

Coal mining is another source of methane. The amount of methane emitted from underground mines is not proportionate to production; it is estimated that underground mines account for over 60 percent of total methane emissions from coal mining. The CMM Project Protocol provides a standardized approach for quantifying, monitoring and verifying GHG reductions from projects that destroy methane at active underground coal mines. This first version of the protocol covers ventilation air methane (VAM) projects and non-pipeline drainage projects. The protocol incentivizes coal mines to destroy or utilize coal mine methane that is currently removed from mines and vented into the atmosphere for safety reasons.

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Nitric Acid Production Project Protocol Public Workshop in Little Rock, AR on October 23

Nitric Acid Production Project Protocol Public Workshop

Title: Nitric Acid Production Project Protocol Public Workshop
Location: Little Rock, AR
The Peabody Little Rock – Salon A
Three Statehouse Plaza
Little Rock, AR 72201
Date: October 23, 2009
Start Time: 3:00 PM CDT
End Time: 5:00 PM CDT
Room Reservations: 1-501-906-4000

RSVP Here

Description:
The Reserve is hosting a public workshop to provide a venue for public feedback on the draft Nitric Acid Production Project Protocol. The public workshop is scheduled for Friday, October 23, 2009 in Little Rock, Arkansas.
If you plan on attending or calling in, please RSVP below by October 19, 2009. An agenda will be provided to all participants prior to the meeting.

If you have questions about the workshop, please contact Nancy Kong at 213-542-0286 or nkong@climateactionreserve.org.

Reserve Staff Draft New Project ‘Start Date’ Policy for Consideration by Board

At its meeting on September 1, 2009 the Climate Action Reserve’s Board of Directors instructed Reserve staff to consider and propose a revised “start date” policy for offset projects that are implemented prior to registering with the Reserve. The Reserve’s current policy states that after a new protocol is adopted, projects with start dates as early as January 1, 2001 are eligible to register for a period of 12 months. The revised policy would address concerns that an eligibility window for projects going back to 2001 no longer provides a strong enough assurance of additionality (even where projects otherwise meet all of a protocol’s additionality and eligibility criteria). The Reserve staff have drafted a revised policy intended to better balance recognition for early actors with the need to ensure rigorous standards for additionality. This revised policy will be considered by the Board at its October 7, 2009 meeting.