We changed our project's capacity after validation. How do we tell Verra?
Describe the change at your next verification, where a validation and verification body (VVB) assesses it. If it affects methodology applicability, additionality or the baseline, as a capacity change can, you also need a revised project description. A deviation cannot add reductions to a period already verified.
First, does it matter to the methodology?
Verra uses the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) guidelines on assessing changes to decide whether a deviation affects the methodology's applicability, your additionality case or the baseline. Verra's own example is a change in project capacity where a different baseline would be more plausible, the methodology would no longer apply, or the investment analysis would change significantly.
If it does affect them
- Describe and justify it in a revised project description and in every later monitoring report.
- Say when the deviation happened and why.
- Explain how it affects applicability, additionality or the baseline.
- The updates to the project description are validated.
If it does not
Describe and justify it in every later monitoring report: when the change happened and the reasons. The project must still conform to the methodology.
Who checks it, and what you cannot do
- A VVB assesses the deviation at your next verification and reports its process, findings and conclusions. For this, it must be accredited for validation.
- You cannot use a deviation to claim additional reductions from a monitoring period that was already verified.
- You may move to a new version of your methodology at any point in the crediting or baseline period and revise the project description to match.
- A deviation is not precedent-setting.
Example: a second furnace added after validation
- March 2027: second furnace commissioned, capacity up by half
- Check the change against the methodology's applicability conditions, your baseline and your investment case
- If all three still hold: describe it in the 2027 monitoring report with the date and reasons
- If any no longer holds: revised project description with justification, assessed at the next verification
- Reductions for the 2026 period that was already verified stay as verified
An example sequence. Your methodology sets the actual tests.
What Senseible does here
Senseible keeps the dated commissioning invoices and the bills before and after the change, so the date and size of what changed are on record. It does not register projects or issue credits; Verra and your validation and verification body do.
Sources: Verra, VCS Standard v5.0 (16 December 2025), section 3.20
Last reviewed 2026-11-04. Section numbers are from VCS Standard v5.0; re-check them when Verra publishes a new version.