Our approach

CNaught’s portfolios are made up of four different categories of project types, which build on a paradigm laid out in the Oxford Principles. Each category has its own strengths and weaknesses. Understanding those strengths and weaknesses allows us to design a portfolio that accounts for them.
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The categories of projects vary across two axes: whether they avoid emissions vs. remove carbon and how long they store carbon. 

Because category III is largely theoretical at this time, with very few projects offering this type of credit, CNaught portfolios are a blend of categories I, II, IV, and V.

Even within individual categories and project types, there is substantial variation in climate impact between individual projects. We closely examine projects to ensure solid evidence of additionality, limited risk of overcrediting, reasonable durability of carbon for the project type, and strong evidence that the project avoids double-counting. We further avoid projects that may cause non-climate harm, such as those sponsored directly by governments with a history of human rights abuses.

The carbon-credit space is fast-moving and ever-changing, and we keep up with macro- and micro-trends so that you don’t have to. At the macro level, that can mean tracking multi-stakeholder efforts like the development of core carbon principles from the Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market (ICVCM); registry-level developments, like Verra’s efforts to revise some of its project methodologies; and new research about the effectiveness of different project types. At the micro level, that means monitoring the performance of projects we support. We proactively seek out information so that we can constantly evaluate projects–all with an eye toward how they might impact our ability to deliver impact and mitigate risk for our customers.