Up Energy Improved Cookstoves Programme, Uganda – CPA No 015

Audit Analysis

The Up Energy Improved Cookstoves Programme in Uganda is a Gold Standard energy-efficiency project with a VVB-confirmed additionality assessment and a quantified 5% leakage deduction, but it is undermined by a project-specific baseline, a 12-item set of cross-document contradictions (including a 41% swing in verified ERR between the 2025 and 2026 verification reports), an unresolved FPIC discrepancy, and a crediting-period mismatch (15 years in the VPA-DD versus 5 years in the monitoring report). The volume of material findings and corrective actions, combined with medium extraction confidence, limits confidence in the data trail.

Project Description

Red Flags

• ⚠Crediting period stated as 15 years in the VPA-DD but 5 years in the monitoring report — a fundamental scope discrepancy that affects the validity of the ex-ante ERR estimate
• ⚠Verified ERR of 159,978 tCO₂e in the February 2025 verification report exceeds the ex-ante lifetime estimate of 113,098 tCO₂e by approximately 41%, while the February 2026 report shows 119,997 tCO₂e (only 6% above ex-ante), indicating a material revision of assumptions between periods
• ⚠FNRB value differs by more than a factor of two between the 2025 report (0.82, local field) and the 2026 report (0.39, national default), directly affecting the magnitude of claimed reductions
• ⚠FPIC status is contradictory: the April 2024 verification report records it as not conducted, while the September 2025 validation report records it as conducted — no reconciliation is provided
• ⚠Twelve corrective actions remain open, including missing CDM tool listings, inconsistent crediting start dates, and incorrect SDG impact values in the ER spreadsheet

Credit Vintages