GS12066 - MicroEnergy Credits – Microfinance for Clean Cooking Product Lines - India - Clean Cooking Project - VPA01

Audit Analysis

A Gold Standard clean-cooking microfinance project in India with a VVB-confirmed combined additionality test, a quantified 5% leakage deduction, and no reported reversal events. However, the absence of a stated buffer pool, a 100% usage-rate assumption without independent verification, a project-specific baseline, and numerous (albeit corrected) material findings in the monitoring report temper confidence. The verified-to-claimed ratio of roughly 93% and pro-rata delivery of about 104% of the annual ex-ante expectation are reassuring, but several transparency gaps remain.

Project Description

Red Flags

• ⚠No buffer pool percentage is stated in any available document, leaving a 15-year crediting period without an explicit permanence safeguard beyond the 5% leakage deduction.
• ⚠Usage rate is assumed at 100% (all distributed cookstoves in use) with no verified usage-rate figure found in the extracted record, creating over-crediting risk if actual adoption or continued use is lower.
• ⚠The monitoring report and verification report disagree on the usage-monitoring method (smart meter vs. annual survey), and the verification report is dated before the stated monitoring period begins, raising questions about which period the figures actually cover.
• ⚠Multiple material findings and corrective actions (incorrect BEy/PEy calculations, inconsistent fNRB values, wrong sample-size formula) indicate the monitoring report required substantial correction before verification could be completed.

Credit Vintages