The Breathing Space Improved Cooking Stoves Programme, India - VPA No. 08 Envirofit

Audit Analysis

The Breathing Space improved cooking stoves project in India is a Gold Standard energy-efficiency project with VVB-confirmed additionality and a quantified 5% leakage deduction, but the verification report identified 14 material findings and 11 corrective actions related to monitoring data quality, and the project assumed a 100% usage rate that was verified at only 81%. The project-specific baseline, absence of a documented buffer pool, and unresolved contradictions in key figures between the monitoring and verification reports moderate confidence in the credit claims.

Project Description

Red Flags

• ⚠14 material findings and 11 corrective actions in the verification report (2021) indicate systemic monitoring data-quality issues, including an incorrect formula in the ER calculator, inconsistencies between survey questionnaires and ER spreadsheet data, and a tampered PoA-DD template
• ⚠Usage rate assumed at 100% in the ex-ante estimate but verified at only 81.2% via annual survey, a 19-percentage-point overestimate that inflates the baseline savings claim
• ⚠No buffer pool or permanence mechanism documented for a project type (cooking stoves) where stove failure or replacement creates reversal risk
• ⚠Contradiction in the fNRB method between the monitoring report (national default) and the verification report (local field measurement) raises questions about which value was actually used in the ER calculation
• ⚠CORSIA eligibility and CCP status are not stated in any available document, leaving dual-channel risk unassessed

Credit Vintages