Monday 10 November 2008, London

Scientific Certification Systems (SCS) has been announced today as the first verifier to be approved under the Voluntary Carbon Standard (VCS) temporary accreditation program. SCS can now perform VCS validations and verifications for a period of 12 months while it pursues full accreditation under ISO.

The VCS verifier temporary accreditation program has been designed by the VCS Board as a rigorous and “fast-track” solution to the global verifier shortage. This shortage has been caused by the increase in the number of emissions reduction projects worldwide and delays in the approval of new verifiers under UNFCCC and ISO systems. This has led to long delays in project approval processes and verification costs of up to three times normal markets rates. The shortage has been hardest felt in North America, but is impacting markets across the globe, particularly India and China.

The VCS accreditation program complements both UNFCCC and ISO systems. It provides a streamlined process to temporarily accredit verifiers who are in the process of going though an UNFCCC or ISO accreditation. Verifiers can be accredited for up to 12 months under the VCS and by the end of that period must be approved under UNFCCC or ISO systems. Those who fail to meet these standards will have their work reviewed by the VCS Association and are financially liable for any over-issuance of credits.

David Antonioli, the newly appointed VCS Association CEO says: “The shortage of verifiers is creating a bottleneck in both the project approval and credit issuance processes, and unnecessarily increasing costs for participants. In the current climate, the market needs a streamlined way to increase the number of qualified verifiers while the ISO and UNFCCC systems build capacity. This is what the new VCS “fast-track” approach to verification does.”

SCS, established in 1984 and accredited as one of the first Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)- endorsed certification bodies in 1995, is a global leader in forest management and wood products certification. Their diverse set of certification and verification services provides forestry operators and manufacturers with a full range of quality services.

Robert J. Hrubes, Senior Vice-President at SCS says: “We are very pleased to receive approval under the VCS Association temporary accreditation process. This approval will allow us to broaden our offering of greenhouse gas verification services and to enhance SCS’ overall abilities to contribute to positive climate change.”

Jerry Seager, new Program Manager of the VCS Association says: “We are delighted to announce SCS as the first approved verifier under our temporary accreditation program. Some projects have had to wait up to nine months to undergo verification and the VCS Association is working hard to ensure that more qualified verifiers, like SCS, are available by the end of the year.”

The Voluntary Carbon Standard (VCS) is already the most popular global standard in the voluntary carbon market. Market analysts estimate that the voluntary carbon market could offset 400 million tonnes of emissions by 2012. Addressing the verifier shortage is fundamental to realizing this growth. Approximately ten verification firms are currently going through the temporary accreditation process and more announcements are expected before the end of the year.

About the Temporary Accreditation Program For information on the VCS temporary accreditation program for verifiers contact Joana Correia from Probus Sigma: jc@probus-sigma.eu or +351 235 778 020. Probus Sigma can answer all questions related to the process and can provide copies of all the documents that shall be completed as part of the application process. For more information on what is required in the application process please see the VCS Association policy announcement at: http://v-c- s.org/docs/Temporary%20Verifier%20Accreditation.pdf

For media information, please contact Tom Howard-Vyse on + 44 (0)207 960 2991 or email thoward-vyse@theclimategroup.org