Improved Woodstoves in Udaipur - Helping Women and Environment

Audit Analysis

This Gold Standard improved cookstove project in Udaipur, India, has a solid additionality foundation (investment test confirmed by the VVB) and a quantified 5% leakage deduction, but is significantly undermined by an extensive list of material findings and corrective actions spanning calculation errors, unit inconsistencies, and missing supporting data. The project-specific baseline, a contradiction in the FNRB methodology between documents, and the absence of a buffer pool or stated permanence mechanism further weaken confidence in the credit claims.

Project Description

Red Flags

• ⚠Over 30 material findings and corrective actions issued by the VVB, including fundamental calculation errors (thermal efficiency averages not matching test results, fuelwood unit errors in tons vs kgs, migrated households not deducted from operational days), raising serious questions about the reliability of the verified ER figures before correction.
• ⚠Contradiction in FNRB methodology: the 2018 verification report states a local field measurement while the 2025 monitoring report references a national default, creating uncertainty about which value underpins the 0.88 FNRB used in calculations.
• ⚠Baseline is project-specific with no stated reassessment date, and the crediting period in the PDD (starting 2014) conflicts with the verification report (starting 2016), creating ambiguity about the true project timeline.

Credit Vintages