The Verified Carbon Standard, operated by the non-profit Verra, is the world's most-used voluntary carbon-credit programme. Under the VCS Program (v5.0: VCS Standard, Program Guide and Registration and Issuance Process), projects quantify emission reductions or removals against approved methodologies, are validated and verified by accredited third-party bodies, and receive VCUs — Verified Carbon Units — issued on Verra's public registry. Each VCU carries a serial number, and retirement on the registry is the evidentiary act behind an offsetting claim. Verra's methodologies and its handling of integrity controversies — particularly around avoided-deforestation baselines — have made it central to the debate over credit quality; it has responded with methodology revisions and its upcoming Scope 3 programme. For claims purposes, a retired VCU supports a compensation claim for the stated tonnes only; it does not by itself substantiate "carbon neutral," "net zero" or impact wording, which depend on the claim rules of the framework the claimant is using.
Conditional relationships
Claims it may support
A relationship does not mean that the standard proves or validates every use of a claim.