ISO 14064 is an offset protocol. It is an independent, voluntary GHG project accounting standard, and is deliberately policy neutral. The ISO 14064 standard consists of three parts. The first part (14064-1) specifies requirements for designing and developing organisation or entity-level GHG inventories. The second part (14064-2) details requirements for quantifying, monitoring and reporting emission reductions and removal enhancements from GHG projects. The third part (14064-3) provides requirements and guidance for the conducting of GHG information validation and verification.
Unlike the GHG Project Protocol, which has specific guidelines on what tools and accounting methods to use, ISO 14064 gives guidance on what to do but does
not spell out the exact requirements. The requirements are usually spelled out only in general terms. For example, ISO points out that additionality needs to be taken into account but does not require a specific tool or additionality test to be used. These would be defined by the GHG programme or regulation under which ISO 14064 is used. ISO 14064 does not focus on co-benefits.
History of Standard
ISO 14064 was developed over several years by the International Organisation for Standardization (ISO). It was launched in the spring 2006.
ISO (International Organisation for Standardization) is the world’s largest developer and publisher of International Standards. ISO is a non-governmental organisation that forms a bridge between the public and private sectors. It is a network of the national
standards institutes of 157 countries.
Financing of the Standard Organisation
ISO’s national members pay subscriptions to cover the operational cost of ISO’s Central Secretariat. The subscription paid by each member is in proportion to the country’s Gross National Income and trade figures. Another source of revenue is the sale of standards. The cost for ISO 14064 is around € 85 for each of the three
Recognition of Other Standards
Because ISO 14064 is an Offset Standard Protocols and not a full fledged offset standard it provides definitions and procedures to account for GHG reductions yet does not define eligibility criteria. ISO 14064 is therefore intended to be used in conjunction with other regulations or standards. For example, the procedures
for the VSC are based on ISO 14064. ISO 14064 is intended by be programme-neutral and the requirements of the programme under which ISO is
used take precedence to the ISO rules.
Number of Projects
Comments on ISO 14064
ISO 14064 can be used as a building block for a full-fledged offset standard. As such it is a useful tool and has been used by many regulatory and voluntary schemes.
In this paper we evaluate the overall quality of offset standards rather than protocols. It would therefore go beyond the scope of this paper to comment on the specifics of the ISO 14064.