Additionality

Written by

Danny Chen

Additionality is critical when justifying the positive benefits of the project development. Nonetheless, in practice, stakeholders should be aware of the perverse incentive problem

The well protected ecosystem led by indigenous peoples and local communities do not meet the additionality criteria. It creates a conflict of interest situation, that efforts are not recognized and their life quality is not improved with financial return.

To mitigate the negative impacts of this problem, currently we have 2 methods for additionality evaluation: Performance Methods, and Activity Methods.

Performance Methods: All performance that meets or exceeds the baseline emission threshold is considered additional.

Activity Methods: All activities on a positive list to pre-qualify as additional.

For current projects with intact condition, the activity methods may help to reward their current practice with financial return.

One thing to note is that additionality does not impact the number of carbon credits or nature credits, it is the evaluation criteria to justify if the project requires additional revenue stream when developing the project.