VCS v4.7· behind the meter
This route is for plants that mostly power their own site.
The three layers
Three layers. Most people think they are the same thing.
Three layers, one path. Most of the confusion in this market is people using those three words interchangeably.
- Standard
- VCS v4.7— the rulebook Verra publishes
- Methodology
- AMS-I.F— the recipe for solar that powers its own site
- Tool
- Additionality tool— the calculation that decides whether you pass
Get those three words straight and this route stops being confusing. Most people never separate them.
Who it fits
- Solar that consumes more than half its output on site.
- Owners chasing the highest value per tonne of the four routes.
- Plants young enough to register a new project before the 2027 cutoff.
- Sites with metering and historical generation data to hand.
What it commits you to
- Crediting period
- 7 years, renewable twice — no early exit
- Time to first payment
- 9 to 18 months from signature
- Deadline
- The next monitoring-period window — open now
- If the project was committed before 1 January 2027, three requirements defer to 2030: a stakeholder engagement plan, a benefit-sharing mechanism and a safeguards assessment.
- Once registered, a verification request is due within five years of your last approved one, or the project is marked late to verify on the registry.
What usually blocks it
Named honestly. Whether any of these apply to your plant is the part the full assessment answers.
Monitoring-period timing
Miss the current window and your plant waits for the next one — roughly seven months of generation you cannot claim yet.
Metering and historical data
Behind-the-meter value depends on self-consumption records that not every site keeps cleanly.
The additionality test
As with any Verra route, you have to show the project needed the carbon revenue to make sense.
Eight questions, three minutes. No account, no email.