Course 07 of 20 · Emissions and Carbon Desk Academy

Credit Quality & Due Diligence

Stage B, Obligation, custody and counterparty assessment. Level 4 of 10.

The quality assessment framework for a credit, covering additionality, baseline, permanence, leakage and verification strength, and the diligence file that evidences it.

121 chapters · 11 modules · every chapter one 8 to 10 minute explainer · builds on: Course 02, Course 04, Course 06

Enrol or enquire See the 121 chapters
How a chapter is delivered

One chapter is one idea taken to the point of use

Each chapter covers one idea to the point where you can use it, and comes two ways: a narrated explainer, and a deep dive audio discussion of around thirty minutes that works the same material at depth.

Self-paced throughout, and the same chapters can be taught as a cohort. Chapters run in order: each one assumes only what the chapters before it taught, and capability belonging to a later course is named and deferred rather than half-covered.

Curriculum

11 modules · 121 chapters

Open any module for its full chapter list, in teaching order.

M0 What Quality Means for a Carbon Credit Ch 1-10
  1. Quality Is a Claim About a Counterfactual
  2. Five Questions Behind Every Credit Assessment
  3. Two Units, One Serial Format, Different Worth
  4. The Buyer Carries the Burden of Proof
  5. Scheme Eligibility Against Buyer Criteria
  6. Reading a Design Document as an Argument
  7. The Working Vocabulary of Credit Quality
  8. Where Quality Risk Sits in a Transaction
  9. Quality Judgement Is Not a Price Judgement
  10. The Shape of a Diligence Programme
M1 The Baseline and the Counterfactual Ch 11-22
  1. What a Baseline Is Trying to Represent
  2. Historic Performance as a Baseline
  3. Common Practice as the Comparison Point
  4. Projected Baselines and Forecast Risk
  5. Dynamic Baselines and Periodic Rebaselining
  6. Baseline Boundary Against Project Boundary
  7. Choosing Among Candidate Baseline Scenarios
  8. Diagnostics for an Inflated Counterfactual
  9. Crediting Period Length and Baseline Decay
  10. Sector-Wide Baselines and Developer Discretion
  11. One Cookstove Programme, Two Baselines
  12. Where Baseline Disagreement Is Legitimate
M2 The Additionality Argument Ch 23-34
  1. What the Additionality Argument Claims
  2. The Regulatory Surplus Test and Its Assumptions
  3. Investment Analysis as Additionality Evidence
  4. Barrier Analysis and What It Can Show
  5. Common Practice Analysis and Its Reference Group
  6. Positive Lists and Automatic Additionality
  7. Prior Consideration and the Evidence of Timing
  8. Did Carbon Revenue Decide? The Causation Question
  9. Policy Interaction and the Double Incentive Problem
  10. Programme Additionality Against Project Additionality
  11. Testing One Grid-Connected Renewable Claim
  12. The Additionality Critique and What It Assumes
M3 Quantification Integrity Ch 35-45
  1. Judging a Quantification Method Without Rebuilding It
  2. Market Leakage and Displaced Activity
  3. Leakage Inside the Project's Own Supply Chain
  4. Negative Leakage and Why It Is Seldom Claimed
  5. Uncertainty Deductions and Confidence Levels
  6. Conservativeness as a Design Principle
  7. Default Factors Against Site Measurement
  8. Sampling Design and What a Small Sample Carries
  9. Monitoring Gaps and How They Are Filled
  10. Over-crediting Diagnostics a Buyer Can Run
  11. Rebuilding One Issuance From Its Monitoring Report
M4 Permanence and Reversal as Quality Questions Ch 46-55
  1. Permanence Is a Property of the Store
  2. Intentional, Unintentional and Gradual Reversal
  3. How Standards Express a Durability Horizon
  4. The Buffer Pool as a Quality Signal
  5. Monitoring Obligations After the Last Issuance
  6. Assessing Reversal Likelihood From Project Documents
  7. Tonne-Year and Discounting Approaches: The Argument
  8. Land Tenure and Legal Durability
  9. Assurance for Geological and Engineered Storage
  10. The Permanence Equivalence Debate and Its Assumptions
M5 Verification Strength Ch 56-66
  1. What a Verification Opinion Attests To
  2. Reasonable Assurance Against Limited Assurance
  3. Materiality Thresholds and What They Permit
  4. Judging the Depth of the Validation Step
  5. Site Visits, Remote Verification and Desk Review
  6. Verifier Accreditation and Scope Limits
  7. Verifier Independence, Tenure and Fee Dependence
  8. Reading a Verification Report for Its Qualifications
  9. Non-conformities, Corrective Actions and Closure
  10. Audit Does Not Equal an Opinion on Additionality
  11. Two Verification Reports, One Project
M6 Methodologies and Standards Ch 67-77
  1. A Methodology's Vintage and Revision History
  2. Where a Methodology Leaves Discretion
  3. Methodology Deviations and Their Approval Trail
  4. Standard Governance and Who Can Change the Rules
  5. Grievance, Review and De-registration Routes
  6. Two Standards, One Activity
  7. Integrity Labels and What They Actually Assess
  8. Jurisdictional and Nested Crediting
  9. Avoidance and Removal: What the Label Tells You
  10. Suppressed Demand and the Equity Argument
  11. When Methodology Choice Changes the Tonne
M7 Safeguards, Rights and Non-Carbon Evidence Ch 78-87
  1. Safeguards as Carbon Quality Evidence
  2. Consent Evidence and How to Test It
  3. Carbon Rights and the Chain of Title
  4. Benefit Sharing Arrangements and Their Records
  5. Grievance Records as a Diligence Source
  6. Co-benefit Claims and Their Evidential Basis
  7. Labour and Gender Safeguard Evidence
  8. Biodiversity and Water Impact Evidence
  9. Human Rights Screening in Carbon Diligence
  10. When a Safeguard Failure Is a Carbon Failure
M8 From Project Quality to Unit Quality Ch 88-97
  1. A Good Project Can Still Yield a Bad Unit
  2. What a Vintage Tells You About the Rules
  3. Tracing a Serial Block to Its Monitoring Period
  4. Double Issuance, Double Counting and Double Claiming
  5. Reconciling the Registry Record Against the File
  6. Suspended, Cancelled and Flagged Units
  7. Prior Holders and the Ownership Trail
  8. Counterparty, Sanctions and Beneficial Ownership Checks
  9. Fraud Indicators in a Credit Offering
  10. The Unit-Level Check Sequence
M9 Building the Diligence File Ch 98-109
  1. What the Diligence File Is For
  2. The Document Inventory and Where Each Comes From
  3. Primary Evidence, Secondary Evidence and Assertion
  4. Recording an Assessment So It Can Be Re-run
  5. The Question Log and the Developer's Response
  6. Planning a Site Visit Around Open Questions
  7. Commissioning Expert Input and Framing the Question
  8. Open Issues, Conditions and Carve-outs
  9. Version Control and the Point of Freeze
  10. Refreshing a File for a Later Vintage
  11. Retention, Confidentiality and Disclosure Limits
  12. A Diligence File Under Examination
M10 Scoring, Decision and the Limits of Assessment Ch 110-121
  1. Turning an Assessment Into a Score
  2. Weighting the Quality Dimensions Against Each Other
  3. Veto Criteria Against Weighted Scores
  4. Using Third-Party Ratings Without Outsourcing Judgement
  5. Calibrating an Internal Scale
  6. Approve, Reject or Approve With Conditions
  7. Monitoring an Approved Project Over Time
  8. Downgrades and the Withdrawal Decision
  9. One Offering Assessed End to End, Part One
  10. One Offering Assessed End to End, Part Two
  11. Where This Framework Is Deliberately Simplified
  12. What Quality Assessment Cannot Tell You

The brochure gives each of these 121 chapters a paragraph on what it covers and what you can do once you have worked through it.

This is course 7 of twenty

It stands alone, and it is also the entry point to the Emissions and Carbon Desk Academy pathway.

Enrol or enquire See the whole pathway