20 February 2015: The Executive Board of the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) has confirmed that CDM project participants and coordinating/managing entities (CMEs) may wish to take on voluntary monitoring of sustainable development co-benefits of CDM project activities and programmes of activities (PoAs) in a manner determined in their own judgement.

The Executive Board considered this issue during its 82nd meeting, which took place from 16-20 February 2015, in Geneva, Switzerland. It also confirmed that the outcome of the voluntary monitoring will have no bearing on the final verification opinion by a Designated Operational Entity (DOE) or final decision by the Board on the issuance of Certified Emission Reductions (CERs).

On standards and tools, the Board considered the issue of developing new methodologies to broaden the CDM’s applicability and agreed on the development of methodologies in the areas of aviation, renewable energy, electrification and household energy supply. The Board further requested the UNFCCC Secretariat to elaborate concept notes on cities, transport, biofuels and agriculture, for consideration by the Board before the development of the methodologies. The Board also adopted a standardized baseline for methane emissions from rice cultivation in the Philippines.

At the meeting, the Board also requested the Secretariat to prepare a concept note on a possible process for re-registering project activities previously deregistered from the CDM, for consideration by the Board at a future meeting. The Board also approved its workplan for 2015, as well as the workplans of the CDM Accreditation Panel (CDM-AP), the Methodologies Panel (MP), the Small-Scale Working Group (SSC WG), the Afforestation and Reforestation Working Group (A/R WG) and the Carbon Dioxide Capture and Storage Working Group (CCS WG) for 2015. [Publication: Report of 82nd Meeting of the CDM Executive Board] [CDM Press Release]