The Registry Illusion
Buyers treat the certification logo as a quality signal. Across rated projects it isn't: average integrity varies widely by registry, and the ordering is not the one the market assumes.
Based on CarbonDecode's ratings of 12,040 projects · registry data as of 2026-08 · 6 min read
- — The registry stamp certifies process, not quality. Average integrity varies by 12 points across the registries buyers currently treat as interchangeable.
- — The two dominant registries split hard: Gold Standard averages 66, Verra (VCS) just 57.9.
- — Verra (VCS), the largest registry by project count, ranks last on average integrity among registries at scale in our data.
- — Verified credit is not safe credit: only 49% of Climate Action Reserve projects are investment grade.
The logo you trust
Ask a buyer how they vet a credit and you'll often hear the registry name mentioned first: it's a Verra credit, it's Gold Standard, it's verified. The certification logo has become the market's default quality signal, a simple shorthand for "someone rigorous checked this."
The data doesn't support that shorthand. When we score every project on the same CCP-aligned scale and average by registry, the averages differ materially, and not in the order many buyers would guess.
Average composite integrity score (0–100), count-weighted. Bar to scale. Registries with fewer than 25 rated projects omitted. IG = share reaching investment grade (BBB or higher).
Why the gap is real, and why it's not the registries' fault
The obvious objection: doesn't this just reflect what each registry hosts? Partly, yes, and that's the point. Verra (VCS) carries the market's deepest inventory of avoided-deforestation, cookstove, and land-use credits, exactly the project types where baselines are modeled and reversals loom. The newer, removal-focused registries at the top of the table skew toward metered, durable carbon.
But that is the buyer's problem. The registry logo doesn't control for type, evidence, or reversal risk; it certifies that a project followed an approved methodology, not that the tonne is high-integrity. Two credits with the same stamp can sit far apart on our scale.
The stamp tells you the paperwork exists; it does not tell you the credit is good.
“Verified” is not “investment grade”
The clearest tell is the investment-grade column. Every project in the table cleared its registry's verification (that's what being listed means). Yet the share that reaches investment grade on our scale varies widely by registry. A verified credit and a defensible credit are different claims, and only one of them is on the certificate.
For a buyer, broker, or auditor, the implication is direct: the registry narrows the field, it doesn't settle the question. Diligence has to happen inside the registry, at the level of the individual project and its evidence, which is precisely what a rating is designe to do.
How these ratings are built
Every project is scored 0–100 and graded AAA–D across six CCP-aligned dimensions (additionality, over-crediting risk, permanence, MRV & methodology rigor, double-counting, and co-benefits) using a transparent, documented rubric applied identically across every registry. Data derives from public registry records (the Berkeley Carbon Trading Project) plus the registries themselves. Registry averages are count-weighted across all rated projects and exclude registries with fewer than 25 projects.
Rate the project, not the logo
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